CALPADS Update Flash #227

To:           Local Educational Agency (LEA) Representatives

From:      California Department of Education (CDE) –
                California Longitudinal Pupil Achievement Data System (CALPADS) Team

Date:       July 12, 2022

Subject:  CALPADS Update FLASH #227

Certification Data Discrepancy Update

The Certification Data Discrepancies (CDDs) were made viewable to LEAs on July 6, 2022. As described in Flash 226, the CDDs were made viewable despite known issues related to a number of the CDDs which were over-triggering. The majority of the issues were triggering on old records, and a few were attributing errors to students who were never enrolled. LEAs will not be required to clean up old data, and the CDE is working to address these defects so that the validations only trigger on recent data.

Since the majority of CDDs are working as designed, the CDDs were made viewable so that LEAs could become accustomed to this new functionality, and begin to clean up data that appropriately triggered a validation. To help LEAs identify the CDDs that they can work on, Attachment 1 in this Flash includes a table that lists, by submission, the CDDs that currently have no known issues. The CALPADS Known Issues list is updated multiple times a day, identifying issues that are resolved as well new issues that are identified. The CDE will also include on the Known Issues list those CDDs for which there is not a problem management ticket, but which have been identified by the CDE as over-triggering. Addressing these issues remains a high priority for the CALPADS team.

The CDE also understands that the CDDs are currently only viewable on the LEA Certification page, and therefore may not be visible to some Special Education Local Plan Areas (SELPAs). The CDE is working to make the Certification Error report available and to include all the CDDs, which would be accessible to SELPAs.

Strategy for Addressing CDDs

Understanding that LEAs may feel overwhelmed by the number of CDDs to resolve, in Flash 226 we suggest that the approach for the next two weeks is for staff to become comfortable with identifying the problem data and the resolution process. Data coordinators may want to first identify CDDs that have a low total count, resolve the error by referring to the Error List for the validation’s suggested resolution, and then proceed to other errors with larger counts. Data coordinators may also want to consider the availability of other internal staff when deciding which CDDs or submissions to address first.

Please remember that all of the CDDs triggered on input in the legacy system, and therefore LEAs should be familiar with the validations. However, the CDE recognizes that these CDDs only became viewable well into the End-of-Year (EOY) submission window, and that LEAs must now resolve a large number of errors during the submission window. Accordingly, as previously stated, the CDE continues to assess LEA progress and will adjust the certification deadline as necessary to ensure that LEAs are able to submit and certify quality data. The CDE will also provide another update letter to superintendents.

Attachment 1
Table 1: CDDs That LEAs Can Work On