CDS Code
Charter School Name
Charter Number
Administrator Name

Dear Administrator:

The California Department of Education (CDE) is responsible for maintaining and updating the County-District-School (CDS) data which is used by both public and private entities in a variety of ways. It is very important that local educational agencies (LEAs) periodically review and update the data particularly with regard to school closures, charter status, and changes to school names, addresses, phone numbers, administrators, and other contact information. In addition, the CDE now requires that all school and district administrators contained in the CDS database have an e-mail address. Failure to update the status and contact information of your school may significantly impact subsequent data collections (California Longitudinal Pupil Achievement Data System (CALPADS), Academic Performance Index (API), etc.) which could in turn affect program participation and funding.

In January 2009, the CDE announced the new Online Public Update for Schools (OPUS) – County-District-School (CDS) Web application. This application was created to allow county and district staff to routinely view and update district, school, and contact information contained in the CDS database. Each county office of education and district has an assigned CDS coordinator who is responsible for periodically reviewing and updating the district and school data via the OPUS-CDS Web application.

CDE is asking each charter school administrator to work with their authorizing LEA to update their charter school data in the CDS database. Please review your school’s data at: http://www.cde.ca.gov/re/sd/ and contact the CDS coordinator of your authorizing LEA to change or update your school’s data. It’s important to identify your school’s CDS code and name in any correspondence sent to the CDS coordinator.

We appreciate your ongoing support in helping us maintain current contact information for all of California’s LEAs. If you have any questions regarding this request or the OPUS-CDS application, please contact the CDS Administrator at 916-327-4014, or by e-mail at cdsadmin@cde.ca.gov.

Sincerely,

Keric Ashley, Director
Data Management Division

KA:ks