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Special Education Child Count Andrea Kunkel, CCOSA General Counsel & ODSS Executive Director & Ginger Elliott-Teague, Ph.D., OSDE Director of Data Analysis Child Count is a count of students enrolled in Local Education Agencies and on an IEP as of October 1 of the fiscal year. In addition to identifying children currently served, the count collects primary, secondary and suspected disabilities, as appropriate; child-level least restrictive environments and early childhood environments; and demographics, including race and ethnicity. The purpose is twofold: to determine state and federal aid and to measure several annual accountability indicators. Because money and accountability are involved, it’s critical that districts provide quality child count data. How?
Student Counts
• In every record in OK EdPlan, the student must have: • a valid STN • finalized eligibility and IEP events • an educational environment code • complete disability category information (primary, suspected, etc.) and related services • a valid grade code • valid race & ethnicity entries • EL status • a date of birth • a gender • an accredited site code and • a valid enrollment status • Students in Developmental Delay (DD) districts (who are categorized as DD) must have a finalized eligibility document in EdPlan and a suspected disability on their current MEEGs • No students age 10 or greater can have a disability category of DD • Students with grade PK must have an updated early childhood environment recorded • Students no longer present in any district must be exited in EdPlan to match the Student Information System (SIS) un-enrollment date and reason • Every student must have the correct enrollment status selected on their personal page - Public School, Residential Facility, Correctional Facility, Home/Hospital, Separate School, or Private School • Students must be enrolled in the district SIS with the appropriate code (including 3 and 4 year olds being served on IEPs), and • All duplicate records must be resolved. How do districts prepare to provide quality child count data? They have appropriate personnel participate in OSDE’s annual child count training and begin the work to complete and correct incomplete and inaccurate information on EdPlan well before October 1, 2020. If a district doesn’t have a student’s IEP finalized by October 1, then the student will not be included in the FY21 SPED child count. If a district isn’t able to resolve an error prior to October 1, it can still be corrected before the end of the day on October 15 – the day by which the superintendent must certify the district’s data for it to be considered timely. If the error isn’t resolved by that time, the child will not be counted.
To ensure that every child is counted, call on OSDE Special Education Services Section personnel for help. They want you to get the state and federal funding to which your district is entitled and for your district to meet your accountability indicators. So get training, start early and seek help!
