CALPADS Update FLASH #313

To:           Local Educational Agency (LEA) Representatives

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

Date:       September 16, 2025

Subject:  CALPADS Update FLASH #313

2025−26 School Year Rollover (excluding Special Education-Related Changes)

Note: All special education (SPED)-related changes to codes and files will be included in a forthcoming Flash, along with other SPED-related information and reminders for the 2025−26 school year.

2025−26 CALPADS Codes changes (non-SPED codes)

The California Department of Education (CDE) implemented changes to CALPADS codes on July 1, 2025 for the 2025−26 school year. These included implementing new codes, retiring codes, and modifying definitions. The recently posted CALPADS Code Sets v17.0 reflect these changes as of July 1, 2025 and are summarized in Table 1 below.

Table 1: 2025−2026 Code Set Updates

* The definition for the Student School Transfer Category Code 5 has been updated to clarify that Code 5 should not be used for students who transfer to a county office of education operated charter school that is not authorized pursuant to California Education Code Section 47605.5.

Guidance for Using New Course Codes: As part of the Fall 2 submission, the three new course codes included in Table 1 above are now available to better identify instructional services provided to students with disabilities and to monitor that the teachers assigned to those courses hold the appropriate credentials/authorizations. To ensure that accurate data are provided to the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing for assignment monitoring purposes, when any of the three new codes—9701, 9702, or 9703—are populated in the Course Section (CRSE) file, it is important to:

Also populate in the CRSE file, Field 9.22 – Instructional Strategy Code with Instructional Strategy Code of 700 – Special Education; and

Populate in the Staff Assignment (SASS) File, Field 8.13 – Staff Job Classification Code, with the Educational Service Job Classification Code of 12 – Teacher.

Ensure that only students with the applicable disability are enrolled in the corresponding CRSE record and state course code.

2025−26 File Changes (Non-SPED files)

For the 2025−26 school year, there is one change to a non-SPED file and the addition of one new file. Both files are required for the 2025−26 End-of-Year (EOY) 1 submission. Specifically:

• A new field, Attendance Recovery Days, will be added to the Student Absence Summary (STAS) file; and
• A new Local Educational Agency Program (LEAP) file will be implemented to collect student attendance days in specified expanded learning programs.

Local Educational Agencies (LEAs) should refer to Flash 305 for more information on these files.

While the CDE generally includes all changes to files in the school year rollover release, the change to the STAS file and the implementation of the new LEAP file were not included in the September 9, 2025 school rollover release. The implementation status of these changes is described below.

Status of STAS File: Some vendors made changes in their student information systems anticipating that the STAS file change would be included in the September 9, 2025 school year rollover and released to the CALPADS production environment. Therefore, LEAs should look to their vendor for guidance as to when to use the STAS file. Understanding that some vendors have already made the change and some LEAs do submit STAS data during the year, the CDE has prioritized making this change to the STAS file in the next few weeks. Along with the updated file, the CDE will release input validations related to the new STAS field, which are described in Flash 305. Once implemented, LEAs will be able to upload STAS data during the year prior to the opening of the EOY submission. As described in the September 2025 CALPADS Regional Update Meetings, the CDE will also implement a RealTime report (formerly known as Operational Data Store report) of Certification Report 14.1 – Student Absenteeism – Count so that LEAs can view the data they upload during the year.

Status of LEAP File: Before implementing the new LEAP file, the CDE will conduct User Acceptance Testing (UAT) with vendors and select LEAs during the January/February 2026 time frame. The UAT will enable vendors to identify any issues on their end, as well as help the CALPADS team identify any defects that can be resolved before the file is released to production. The CDE plans to release the new LEAP file to production before the May 2026 opening of the EOY submission.