CALPADS Update Flash #303

To:           Local Educational Agency (LEA) Representatives

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

Date:      June 9, 2025

Subject:  CALPADS Update FLASH #303

Guidance for Reporting High School Students Who Graduate or Complete by August 15

The purpose of this Flash is to reiterate guidance for reporting exit and completion data to the California Longitudinal Pupil Achievement Data System (CALPADS) for students graduating or otherwise completing high school after the regular school year ends and prior to the August 15 graduate cut-off date. These students are often referred to as “summer graduates.”  

This Flash also explains how summer graduates/completers will be counted as one-year graduates/completers and included in the graduation cohort (if applicable), based on the date they graduate/complete and the corresponding one-day enrollment/exit records submitted to CALPADS. Additionally, because the 2024−25 End of Year (EOY) 3 submission—including the certification of one-year graduates and completers—closes one week prior to the August 15 graduate cut-off date (August 8, 2025), this Flash provides guidance for exiting students to ensure they are properly accounted for as one-year graduates/completers, cohort graduates, and, importantly, identified as “summer graduates.”

Best Practices for Reporting “Summer” High School Graduates and Completers

As communicated in Flash 274 (https://www.cde.ca.gov/ds/sp/cl/calpadsupdflash274.asp), local educational agencies (LEAs) should exit all students as of the last day of the regular school year. LEAs should exit students with exit dates that equal the last day of the regular school year and exit code E156 – GD12ContinuedEd, when students have not completed all state and local graduation requirements (unless exempt from local requirements), or all requirements for other completion statuses, but who will potentially complete the remaining requirements during the summer. See Table 1 below.

Table 1: Exiting Potential Summer Graduates and Completers

Then, for students that meet graduation requirements, or otherwise complete, on or before August 15, 2025, LEAs should enroll and exit students from the school that is granting the diploma (or certificate) using one-day enrollment/exit records. See Table 2 below.

Table 2: Enrolling and Exiting Summer Graduates and Completers

Students with Disabilities in Extended School Year (ESY) Program

For students with disabilities in an Extended School Year (ESY), LEAs may exit those students with the date they complete their requirements, if that date is before the LEA certifies their EOY 3 submission. If students have not yet completed requirements before the LEA certifies EOY 3, LEAs should exit students with a E156 – GD12ContinuedEd, and then upload a one-day enrollment if they complete requirements before August 15. CALPADS data are not used for average daily attendance (ADA) reporting. Therefore, exiting students from CALPADS when they may still be earning ADA for ESY will not impact the ADA (includes ADA earned during ESY) LEAs report.

SENR0718E3 Validation Update: STAS Record Not Required for One-Day Summer Graduate/Completer Enrollments/Exits

SENR0718E3 (formally CERT 128) – Missing Absence Summary Data for Student triggers when LEAs submit Student Enrollment (SENR) records for students in grades TK–12 without corresponding Student Absence Summary (STAS) records for the same school year. As a result, LEAs who followed last year’s guidance and submitted one-day enrollments/exits for summer graduates/completers after June 30, 2024, began receiving SENR0718E3 errors when the 2024−25 EOY submission opened. However, because the STAS file is a full replacement file, uploading STAS records to fix these errors was overwriting all other STAS data. Since STAS records are unnecessary for these students, SENR0718E3 has been updated to exempt the requirement to upload STAS data for any one-day enrollments/exits with Student Exit Category E230 – CompleterExit and any School Completion Status code, dated between July 1 – August 15.

One-Day Enrollment/Exit Dates and Inclusion in One-Year Graduate/Completer Counts and Cohort Reports

Table 3 below describes how summer graduates/completers will be counted based on one-day enrollment/exit dates. The guidance provided also addresses how to submit records for students graduating/completing between August 8, 2025—the close of EOY 3 submission—and the August 15 graduate cut-off date.

The California Department of Education (CDE) recommends the following steps for 2024−25:

1. Exit students at the end of the regular school year as described above in the section Best Practices for Submitting “Summer” High School Graduates and Completers.
2. Before certifying EOY 3:
   • Submit one-day enrollment/exit and completion status records (e.g., E230/100) for students exited in step 1 who actually graduate or complete before the LEA certifies their EOY 3 submission. These students will be certified as one-year graduates/completers as part of the LEAs’ EOY 3 submission and will be included in one-year graduate/completer reports and in 4-year cohort reports if they are part of that cohort.
   • Submit one-day enrollment/exit and completion status records for students who are expected to graduate or complete after the LEA certifies EOY 3 but on or before August 15, 2025. For example, LEAs that certify on August 8 should submit one-day enrollment/exit records for students who are expected to graduate after August 8, 2025 but on or before August 15, 2025. CALPADS allows LEAs to submit enrollments 6 months in the future and exit dates 30 days in the future. Therefore, LEAs will be able to submit one-day enrollment/exit and completion status records for these students. These students will be included in 2024−25 one-year graduate/completer reports and 4-year cohort reports if they are a part of that cohort.
3. If LEAs do not submit students who graduate or complete by August 15 before they certify their EOY 3 submission, they should submit one-day enrollment/exit and completion status records for students who graduate or complete before data are pulled on August 15, 2025 at 11:59 pm. If LEAs fail to do so, these students will not show up in the 2024–25 reports; they will not be included in 2024−25 one-year graduate/completer or 4-year cohort reports because they were reported outside the graduate reporting cycle of August 16, 2024 – August 15, 2025. If LEAs submit these graduates/completers with enrollment and exit dates after August 15, 2025 but in time to be included in the next year’s reporting for graduates and completers, they will show up as 5th year graduates/completers on Reports 1.22/1.23 (One-year Grads) in 2025–2026, and they may show up as part of the 5-year cohort (if they were part of the prior-year 4-year cohort (i.e., they were first-time 9th graders in 2021−22).

Table 3 below describes how students will be counted based on one-day enrollment/exit dates.

Table 3: How Summer Graduates/Completers will be Counted Based on One-Day Enrollment/Exit Dates

*First-time 9th graders in 2021−22 are included in the 2024−25 4-Year cohort report; they may be counted as graduates in the 5-Year cohort report if they did not graduate in 2024−25 but graduated in 2025−26.