CALPADS Update FLASH #262

To:           Local Educational Agency (LEA) Representatives

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

Date:      November 14, 2023

Subject:  CALPADS Update FLASH #262

New Data Discrepancy Functionality

The Data Discrepancy (DD) functionality will be available in CALPADS beginning November 14, 2023.

Overview of Data Discrepancy Process

There were over one hundred Input Validation Rules (IVRs) that triggered on input in the legacy system which now trigger after the data have been posted to CALPADS. These IVRs were transitioned because they could not be evaluated based on data within the same file and needed to be compared to data that were already in CALPADS. These validations now trigger after the data are posted and are called “data discrepancies” (DDs). This change was made to reduce the time it takes for files to load into CALPADS. Thus far, these DDs have not been visible to local educational agencies (LEAs) until a submission window opens, at which point LEAs see these errors as Certification Data Discrepancies (CDDs) in the certification User Interface (UI). To certify a submission, LEAs must resolve CDDs, in addition to fatal Certification Validation Rules (CVRs).

The California Department of Education (CDE) has been developing a DD UI that will provide LEAs visibility of the DDs as they occur throughout the year, regardless whether there is a submission window open. This past summer, the CDE conducted User Acceptance Testing (UAT) on the DD UI, and additional enhancements have been implemented based on LEA input provided during UAT. While additional enhancements identified in UAT will be implemented in the coming weeks, the feature is ready for use, and it is available now. This provides LEAs the benefit of being able to view and resolve Fall 2 DDs prior to the opening of the Fall 2 submission window.

How to Access the Data Discrepancy User Interface (UI)

The Data Discrepancy feature can be found in CALPADS on the left Navigation pane below the “Certification Status” item.

There are two existing security role types that LEA Level users must have to access the data within DD UI:

• Any Role: An active user with any role will be able to navigate to the page, but the display will be limited until a file-specific View role is added.
• Edit Role: The “file type” (SENR, SINF, etc.) Edit role allows individuals to view the summary grid counts, open and view the record detail associated with the discrepancy, and download file specific discrepancy extracts.

Data Discrepancy Training

LEAs should view the CALPADS Data Discrepancies Functionality training which can be found on the CSIS YouTube Training channel at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kg_t-CNpjhk.

When to View and Resolve DDs

The benefit of the DD feature is that it enables LEAs to view DDs on data in CALPADS, before a submission window opens. Therefore, if LEAs have uploaded Fall 2 data to CALPADS, LEAs will be able to view their Fall 2 DDs before the Fall 2 window opens. Since the End-of-Year (EOY) submission looks at cumulative data for the entire school year, LEAs will be able to view and resolve EOY DDs on an ongoing basis as data are submitted, minimizing the number of CDDs that they will have to resolve once the submission window opens.

Coming Enhancement to DD UI

The enhancements planned for the DD UI include the following:

1. Summary Counts: Make the Error Count link to the Display Grids to auto filter.
2. Update the Extract Modal defaults to pass through selected filters from the UI:
   1. Academic Year (AY)
   2. Cert Cycle
   3. File Type (if any)
   4. LEA (needed for State users)
   5. Error Severity
3. Allow extract of the Display Results as another alternative for users who would like complete list of DDs, but not necessarily the entire file type layout.
4. Modify the Extracts page to allow access to request directly (not just via the DD UI).
5. Enhance the information displayed to make it clearer whether the DDs displayed also correlate to the CDDs appearing in a Revision during an active certification cycle.