If you have the GCE-7 validation error triggering for grade 4 students (Good Cause Exemption of EX_MLL is not allowed for the student when no MLL program is found. Student with GCE errors will not be included or counted for any additional certifications), check the ML program record for the student. If there is an end date, including a future end date, on the ML program, GCE-7 will trigger because there is no active ML program for the student.

Change Log - find the Change Log in the School Support Hub to find guidance documentation that has been updated for the 2026 school year.

DEX Reporting in Development - find the DEX Reporting in Development log in the Communications Hub for the 2026 school year. This log is provided to inform schools of items that are currently under consideration, approved for development, in development, or deployed to DEX.

Known & Resolved Issues - find the Known & Resolved Issues log in the Communications Hub of Knowledge Hub for the 2026 school year. This log provides the status of Known Issues related to DEX reporting.

IDOE is aware of the concerns for FACTS and Skyward Q customers where the first sync has not yet been performed.  We are aware that FACTS customers may not be able to sync data until the first or second week of August.  Skyward Q customers may not be able to sync until after July 30th.

Additionally, DEX Badging Status link is provided to inform schools of each Indiana vendor's certification status for the 2026 school year.  Please note column "F" on the document.  If the vendor is not badged for Student School Associations, IDOE is not aware if the vendor has the ability to allow their customers to provide the Grade Level Reason (GCE) data on the student's enrollment record. This data provides the reason a student may be promoted to 4th grade when IDOE does not find a passing IREAD score and fulfills the requirements with Indiana retention statute.

In order to facilitate the collection of data regarding who is providing the education for virtual students, three new (Service Descriptor, Service Begin Date, and Service End Date) fields are being added in Data Exchange. The information provided will assist in the calculation of the teacher compensation percentage for those schools that have virtual students. Please see this memo for more information. Contact IDOE’s Office of School Finance with any questions.

Just a reminder that school calendars must be provided to DEX before Student School Association (Enrollment) data is provided and validated.

Be advised that the Corporation Test Coordinator staff assignment should be provided to Data Exchange and must also be provided via DOE Online.

REMINDER: GCE validations are running against grade 4 enrollment data at this time.

You will find the following GCE guidance posted to Knowledge Hub > School Support Hub > Reporting Guides > Enrollment.

• Guidance has been added to How to Report Enrollment / WithdrawalPreview

• Template 015 (Student School Association) has been updated to include the new ‘GradeLevelReasonDescriptor’. NOTE: Template 015 tutorial has not yet been updated.

• Find under Tutorials a GCE Support video and slide presentation prepared by the Office Of English Learners,

• There is a new section found under the Tutorials menu titled 'Good Cause Exemption (GCEs).

  • Find here the GCE Flowchart (1).pdfPreview

Office hours sessions are currently being scheduled with specific topics and open forum sessions. Please refer to the Calendar on the Upcoming Events page in Knowledge Hub. As the new school year begins, Office Hours sessions will again be offered on Tuesday and Thursday on certain weeks to accommodate Business Owner sessions on specific data sets.

Tuesday, 8/5/25 - 1:00 - 2:30 pm - open forum

Thursday, 8/7/25 - 1:00 - 2:30 pm - DEX Attendance walk through - Selina Snelling

Tuesday, 8/12/25 - 10:30 - 12:00 pm - open forum

Thursday, 8/14/25 - 10:30 - 12:00 pm - Template Q&A - Michelle Tubbs

Tuesday, 8/19/25 - 1:00 - 2:30 pm - open forum

Thursday, 8/21/25 - 1:00 - 2:30 pm - Multilingual Learners - Adam Pitt

Tuesday, 8/26/25 - 10:30 - 12:00 pm - open forum

Tuesday, 9/2/25 - 1:00 - 2:30 pm - open forum

Tuesday, 9/9/25 - 10:30 - 12:00 pm - open forum

Tuesday, 9/16/25 - 1:00 - 2:30 pm - Calendar, Attendance, Pupil Enrollment - Vanessa Bachle

Tuesday, 9/23/25 - 10:30 - 12:00 pm - open forum

Thursday, 9/25,25 - 10:30 - 12:00 pm - Special Education - Brandon Myers

Tuesday, 9/30/25 - 1:00 - 2:30 pm - open forum

IDOE launched a new statewide platform for managing Individual Education Programs (IEPs) and Individual Learning Plans (ILPs) for the 2025-2026 school year on Friday, July 18. Developed in partnership with PowerSchool, IDOE Special Programs will replace the current IEP and ILP platform. Educators can access the new IDOE Special Programs system via the LINK portal by having the “Student Support Plans” role assigned to them for the upcoming school year.  Ideally, these roles should be set within your local student information system. Ideally, these roles should be set within your local SIS. Those providing cooperative access will need their LINK Security Coordinators to enter this role via the LINK Security Portal for the new school year. A login guide for educators may be found here. 

Access to most IDOE applications depend on the accurate role assignment within the LINK Portal. All superintendents and leaders of non-public schools should login to LINK and review/update who their Security Coordinators are.   

• Instructions for organization leaders on how to designate/update the security coordinators is found here. 

• New public and Choice schools setup of the LINK portal is found here. 

• If you are a new superintendent or the organization leader of a non-public school and need the first account configured, please email link@doe.in.gov.

The LINK Portal is able to recognize all public, charter, and accredited non-public schools’ local Google G-Suite or Microsoft 365 accounts. IDOE configures the organization’s leader as the first account, and then this person logs in to designate up to two security coordinators, who are responsible for overseeing the setup of roles for others in the organization.  Contact link@doe.in.gov with any questions.

Security coordinators for all public, charter, and accredited non-public schools are responsible for ensuring their organization’s key contacts for the upcoming school year are set. Required contacts are Superintendent, Principal, Special Education Director, and Chief Technology Officer. Additional contact descriptors can be found here. 

LINK roles, including the key contacts, are designed to be sent from the local Student Information System (SIS) to Data Exchange/LINK. When a person has an account in the local SIS, this is where the LINK roles should be set, according to the SIS instructions. Otherwise, when the staff classifications are resynched/resent to Data Exchange/LINK, they will replace any roles set with what is in the SIS. 

• Security Coordinator Instructions can be found here. 

• ICHAMP (Indiana Complaint, Hearings and Mediation Process) will utilize the following LINK key contacts: Superintendent and Special Education Director. It is essential that these two key contacts are reviewed by security coordinators and updated based on any necessary changes. 

A list of key contacts assigned may be found here.

The LINK Security Portal is now recognizing roles identified in both the prior and upcoming school years’ databases. Roles for the new school year are to be entered prior to Monday, September 1. This data may be provided directly from a school’s SIS. Staff not associated by this date will lose their access to IDOE systems. Prior year staff roles should not be removed. IDOE recommends roles be entered and managed in their local SIS; however, three options are available:

• Preferred option: Enter staff roles in the local student information system (SIS) per vendor’s instructions and send educator data for the new school year to IDOE.

• Add a staff role manually for the new school year via the Security Portal.

• Upload templates via Data Exchange.

To avoid data loss, please refrain from using multiple methods for a staff member.  

IDOE is launching a new statewide platform for managing Individual Education Programs (IEPs) and Individual Learning Plans (ILPs) for the 2025-2026 school year mid-July. Developed in partnership with PowerSchool, IDOE Special Programs will replace the current IEP and ILP platform. All schools will have access to IDOE Special Programs starting in late July. 

Educators will access the new IDOE Special Programs system via the LINK portal by having the “Student Support Plans” role assigned to them for the upcoming school year.  Ideally, these roles should be set within your local student information system. Those providing cooperative access will need their LINK Security Coordinators to enter this role via the LINK Security Portal for the new school year beginning Monday, July 1. A login guide for educators may be found here. 

Reporting enrollment data as soon as possible will be newly important for the 2025-2026 school year due to new state laws around promotion to 4th grade and because access to the state’s new IEP system depends on this information. It is no longer necessary to wait until the first day of the school calendar to begin sending enrollment (SSA) records to Data Exchange (DEX). IDOE will begin showing data that has been provided to DEX on Tuesday, July 15, and will begin running validations against the data. 

• Allowing enrollment data to flow as soon as possible will alert school staff if there are any concerns with a student being reported in 4th grade. (Data Exchange will process 4th grade enrollments according to new promotion rules related to IREAD proficiency.) Schools will have time to determine if the student without a passing IREAD score qualifies for a Good Cause Exemption (GCE) to the retention statute. The earlier this data is submitted, the more time schools will have to determine if the student must be retained in 3rd grade, contact parents, make updates to student schedules, etc. The earlier schools have this information the better for school staff, parents, and students.

• Allowing enrollment data as soon as possible will also assist with the new IEP/ILP system, which is set to go live on Friday, July 18. PowerSchool Special Programs (PSSP) will begin ‘pulling’ enrollment data from DEX which in turn will allow school staff to have access to student files within the special program’s software. Staff access to an IEP/ILP is entirely dependent on accurate enrollment records being submitted to IDOE.

IDOE will host a webinar for school attendance officers on Monday, August 25 from 2 to 3 p.m. ET. This webinar will provide information on attendance data, as well as an opportunity to discuss policies, procedures, and initiatives to increase and sustain student attendance. Please register for the webinar here. Contact Stephen Balko with any questions.

DC lists are now available for July. There are a couple of bugs preventing all students from populating into the New Matches list and multiple lists are not downloading as expected. Please follow the instructions below until the issues are resolved.

Please follow these instructions: 

1. Navigate to Review New Matches. 

2. Click Download New Matches. This list will contain only a fraction of your total number of DC students.

3. Then navigate to the Search Approved Students option. 

4. Click Download Year to Date Matches.

5. Put a date range of 7/1/2025 to 7/25/2025. 

6. Click Download. This list will contain all of the students that have been identified as DC for school year 2025-2026 so far.

Having issues uploading DC spreadsheets to your point of sale (POS) or student information system (SIS)? Please contact the software company for guidance. IDOE cannot assist with local software issues. 

New to DC? There is a DC Basics webinar on Thursday, July 31 at 3 p.m. ET. Register here.

New resource: Free and Reduced Fact Sheet for Data Managers.

 Issues and questions related to DC functionality within CNPweb can be submitted to the CNPweb Help Form.

A new fillable Good Cause Exemption (GCE) documentation template for English learners is available to support the transition from IILP to IDOE Special Programs following the summer retest. While use of this form is optional, it is available to streamline documentation during this transition. To use the form:

• Download and open it in a PDF editor.

• Complete a separate form for each student for whom a GCE meeting is held.

• Maintain documentation and upload the completed forms to IDOE Special Programs once the system is live.

Contact IDOE’s Office of English Learning and Migrant Education with any questions.

IDOE has provided guidance regarding the process to exit eligible students from EL status through a review of additional evidence alongside WIDA results. The Exit Criteria for English Learners Guidance has been updated to apply to 2025 WIDA ACCESS and Alternate ACCESS results. Accompanying resources, such as training materials and Decision-Making Tool templates, can be found on IDOE's English Learning and Migrant Education webpage . Per the guidance, students provisionally determined proficient via an additional evidence review must be submitted to IDOE for approval prior to formally exiting. The window to submit these students is now open and closes Friday, August 22. Contact IDOE’s Office of English Learning and Migrant Education with questions.

The school and corporation profile amendment submission window for the 2025-2026 school year is open until Sunday, August 31. In order to ensure the Indiana Department of Education (IDOE) maintains accurate information, all schools and school corporations must provide notice when changes are made that affect school openings, closures, and reconfigurations. Information on the submission process can be found here. Contact IDOE’s Office of School Accountability with any questions.