SpEd Forms: Recent improvements (MN)

IMPORTANT: This update includes the first release of the "2010 form collection" which contains a new IEP reflecting recent changes to the state model IEP.

Significant changes in the 2010 IEP:

1. Race/ethnicity selections revised.
2. Secondary disability added.
3. "all-in-one" Present Levels page added.
4. Only state approved accommodations can be selected for state assessments.
5. The diploma requirements page been updated.

Settings in place before the update remain unchanged. To use the 2010 form collection teachers can select "2010 form collection" from the drop down at the top of the form menu. Administrators may control or limit access to form collections in Admin>>Organization>>Preferences.

Additional changes posted -

Administrators:

1. The "Services current" report now includes estimated daily totals for indirect, direct and total estimated minutes per day.
2. A new administrative preference allows districts to "Show direct/indirect time for activity logs."
3. New administrative preferences have been added to show/hide the 2010 forms collection.
4. Navigation has been updated for the links that appear when you hover over the buttons for each student on the (admin) "Student List".
5. "School" now appears in the "Order by" drop downs of administrative reports.
6. Significant changes have been made to the MARSS reporting interface.

MA Forms:

1. A "Case manager" column has been added to the MA Clerk menu. To make room for the case manager column, "Gender", "Plan" and "Grade" were removed but are easily viewed by hovering over each row for the students.
2. You can now search by service provider on the "Create/edit claim transmission", "Reconciliation", "Total amount paid" and "Service minutes and groups" reports.
3. The Federal Share percentages have been updated.
4. The "Uniform Cover Sheet" (for "Assistive Technology" claims) now more closely resembles the state form.
5. The "MA services dates on weekend" custom report can be filtered by serving district. To take advantage of this update your super administrator must delete the original report and then run the "Update Database" script in "SpEd Forms maintenance".
6. The "Physician Statement of Need" has been completely updated.
7. The Physicians fax number has been added to the "MA Parental Consent".
8. Options have been added to the "Description of ACTUAL SERVICES provided" drop down list on the "Activity Log".
9. The district name is now displayed at the top of the "Services setup" page.
10. Mileage that is entered as a decimal on the "Trip log" will now be rounded to the nearest whole number.
11. Assistive Technology claims will now show the correct rate when the batch file is created.
12. On the "Edit Claim" screen and on the "Activity Log", the "MA Setting" can be set for each individual claim/activity.
13. The "MA services on no-school days" custom report has been updated to filter out claims marked as "Not Billable". To take advantage of this update you must delete the original report and then a super administrator must run the "Update Database" script in "SpEd Forms maintenance".
14. The electronic signature feature has been added to the supervisor's name of the "Activity Log". Once the supervisor has "signed" the log, users will no longer be able to add or edit activities.
15. The "MA Parental Consent" has been updated.

ER forms:

1. A section for "Absence or delay of spoken language" has been added to the "Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD)" template and criteria.
2. Wording has been updated on the DHH template and the DHH criteria.
3. "Sensory Integration" appears as a new category under SpEd Forms test templates and the "Infant/Toddler Sensory Profile" has been added to this category. "Sensory Processing Measure (SPM)", "Sensory Profile", "Sensory Profile School Companion" and "Short Sensory Profile" have also been moved from "Early Childhood" to this new category.
4. "Visual Puzzles" has been added to the (Intelligence) test template: "Weschler Adult Intelligence Scale - 4th Edition (WAIS IV)".
5. A new test template has been added to the "Achievement" category: "Weschler Individual Achievement Test - 3rd Edition (WIAT-III)".
6. The Evaluation date will now be displayed in red underneath the listing of the "Evaluation Report" on the student's History menu.

Service Plans:

1. Drop downs choices have been updated in the "Non-Individualized Para Services" section of the "Program Modifications and Supports" drop down on the IEP services page.
2. MARSS records will no longer be automatically created when finalizing service plans, etc.
3. "(primarily direct instruction and services)" has been added to the Services (form) page and "Least Restrict Environment" has been corrected to "Least Restrictive Environment".
4. A field has been added to the IFSP "Student Information" page to "Document reason if the 45 day time line was not met".
5. The "Service" and "Method" drop down menus on the IFSP services page will now show the correct options.
6. The "IEP date" and "Amended" date (if applicable) now appear on the top right of the Spanish Progress Report.
7. The fields on the English and Spanish versions of the Progress Report will now use separate fields for each version.
8. The empty link to the "Demographics Page" has been removed from the IIIP "Family/Student Considerations".
9. "and Parent" was added to the statement at the bottom of the "Transfer of Rights at Age of Majority" section on the "Transition Services (Page 2)".
10. On the "Student Information" page of the IEP, a new drop down has been for "Relationship to child" (just above each "Parent/Guardian Name").
11. A new version of the IEP (2010) is available in SpEd Forms. The "Student Information", "Goals", "Assessments" and "Services" pages have undergone changes and a new page has been added for "Present Levels". New finalizations are ready for the new IEP/ISP/IIIP variations.
12. The "Agreement to Amend" and "Classroom Adaptations & Modifications" pages have been swapped on the 2010 IEP, print and "Go to..." menus.
13. Users are no longer limited to the current number of goals on the Progress Report. As entries are saved, new blank fields are made available.
14. A link to the "Authorization for Release of Information" now appears on the 504 menu.
15. When the current IEP/ISP/IIIP is an "Amendment", the Amended date will be displayed at the top right of the print pages.
16. Users can now order goals on the 2008 IFSP "Outcomes/goals" page.
17. "Other" services can now be saved on the "Services and Modifications" page of the Spanish IEP.
18. The "Primary disability" is now required for the current IEP/ISP/IIIP validation.
19. You will now see the IEP date and Amendment date (if applicable) on the top right corner of the current Progress Report's print page.
20. On the "Transition planning" page of the current IFSP, the "Federal Setting" code will be displayed instead of its description.
21. The display of the serving/providing district will now be shown with the ID number along with the name of the district.
22. On the "Student Information" page of the current IEP/ISP/IIP, the size of the MARSS ID field has been extended to show all characters.
23. An issue has been resolved that prevented some users from validating services on the current IFSP.
24. On the current IFSP, "Document reason if the 45 day time line was not met:" has been added to the "Student Information" page and "Description of Outcome Progress:" has been added to the "Outcomes/goals" page.

Prior written notices, consents and related forms:

1. The child's name has been incorporated into the drop down choices for "Description of the action(s) proposed or refused by the district" on the "Prior Written Notice".
2. On the "Prior Written Notice", the first abbreviation of "IEP" has been changed to "Individualized Education Plan (IEP)".
3. The current "Parental Consent/Objection" form can now be finalized.
4. The "Part B" and "Part C" check boxes have been removed from the "Parental Consent/Objection" form, the statements will only reflect wording for special education.

Response to intervention:

1. The interventions interface has been implemented.

Additional Forms:

1. On the "Notice of a Team Meeting", the layout of the team members on the print page has been updated for more room.
2. A new form has been added for "Medical Documentation: ADHD".
3. The link to "Alternate Behavior Intervention Plan" has been removed from the bottom of the "Behavior Intervention Plan".
4. An "Interventions" page has been added to the General Education tab.
5. On the "Student Acknowledgement And Tuition Agreement", the "Program contact" listed in the "Serving District information" section will be displayed as the person to return the form to.
6. The "Performance Evaluation Area" is now the "Performance Assessment Area" and this form has been updated.
7. A field for "Crisis intervention plan and conditional procedures:" has been added to the Positive Behavior Support Plan.
8. The "Referral Review and Assessment Determination" will now show the correct navigation to the "Evaluation/Reevaluation Plan Prior Written Notice".
9. On the "Student Acknowledgement And Tuition Agreement", the name of the "Program Contact" is also displayed at the bottom page (...return this form to...).
10. When the "District Name (resident)" is saved on the "Student Acknowledgement And Tuition Agreement", all available information for that district will be automatically populated into those fields.
11. The "Manifestation Determination" has been updated.
12. The "Emergency Health Information Card" had been updated.

General:

1. In the "Status end (Exit reason)" drop down, the choice for "Student graduated (does not include IEP/IFSP/IIIP graduates)." has been simplified to "Students graduated."
2. The "Social Security" field on the "Student Setup" has been updated to prevent users from receiving an error if too many characters are entered into that field.
3. The description of "Status" code [1] has been changed to "SpEd: Not Evaluated (New Referral, not EC)". To help administrators distinguish "Status" code [2], a new code of [93] ("SpEd: EC Evaluated") has been added just above the existing code of [2] ("EXIT: SpEd: Evaluated: does not need special education services"). When a MARSS extract is created, [93] will be automatically converted to [2] (the proper code for MARSS reporting).
4. The "Team member list" in "Your setup" has been updated to include fields for address, city, state, zip and email. A new "Select" pop-up link then makes use of these team member fields. This new "Select" pop-up appears on all pages that include a field for the case manager and their contact information.
5. The student's information will no longer be changed in history records when forms (such as the "Student Setup" page) are updated.
6. In the "Go to..." menu, the references to "Form menu", "History menu" and "MA menu" have been replaced with "Student menu". When "Student menu" is chosen, the user will automatically be taken back to the most recent major menu that had been accessed by that user.
7. Several forms have been updated to include the secondary parent/guardian name (if available) when "Dear (primary parent/guardian)" is used.
8. The "Credentials" drop down list (in "Your setup") has been updated to reflect older licenses still supported by the Minnesota Department of Education.
9. On the "Communication Log" menu, a new "School Year" drop down list allows users to select a school year to limit the entries that appear on the menu.
10. Users will no longer see the "All students" checkbox on the "Special education" tab of the "Work with students" page. All students will be shown by default and users still have the option to select "Inactive" (students assigned to the user who are not currently in special education), "MA eligible" (those that have been marked as "Eligible" for MA services) and/or "Managed by me" (only those students that are directly managed by the user).
11. On the "Work with students" page, warnings are available for students that are 21 years old. An orange face appears 90 days before their 21st birthday and a red face appears when they are 21 or over.
12. Wording has been changed on the "Pickup Student" feature which reads: "You are requesting [student's name/id]. The student was found on the remote server. Would you like to pick up this student?" and instead of saying "Create New Record for [student]", the button says "Pick up [student]".
13. "Race/Ethnicity" information has been added to the bottom of the "Student Setup" page.
14. When adding a new student to SpEd Forms, the default "Native language" will be "English".
15. The student's name will no longer be changed on older history records when a change is made to that student's current name.
16. A customer service survey link now appears toward the bottom of all emailed support request solutions.