USBE staff detail year-end Utrecs deadlines, SSID merge process and fatal-error checks

Utah State Board of Education staff reminded local education agency (LEA) data managers on May — during a state data training webinar — that year-end Utrecs/UTracks submissions must be finalized in time for the July 7 state freeze and that several pre‑submission deadlines now guarantee fixes will be applied before the year‑end processing.

The state advised LEAs to submit SSID merge requests, historical updates and respond promptly to any help‑desk follow up so merges and updates complete before finalization. Riley, a USBE staff member, said the deadline for historical update requests is Monday, June 23 at 5 p.m., and the deadline for year‑end finalization is Monday, July 7 at 5 p.m. Riley also announced a new deadline for year‑end SSID merge requests: Monday, June 16 at 5 p.m., saying that requests received with complete information by that date are guaranteed to be completed before the year‑end submission is finalized.

Why it matters: fatal errors and unresolved SSID issues can block student records during the state's ETL process, which affects rostering, reporting and funding. USBE staff urged LEAs to finalize early, maintain staff availability through the July 7 deadline and respond quickly to ticket requests so tickets do not auto‑resolve after seven days.

SSID merge process and ticketing Katrina, a USBE staff member who led the SSID training, reviewed the required fields and the ticketing workflow. She said all primary attributes — including first, middle and last name, birth date and the school ID to be kept — must match exactly across SSID lines for a merge to be allowed. Katrina advised searching by partial name fragments (three or four characters) to surface alternate spellings and then checking the student history to see which LEA created each SSID.

The SSID merge now must be submitted through the application help desk at schools.utah.gov (select “submit a request” → “SSID merge request”). The ticket form requires: the SSID to be kept (state will keep the lower SSID number when applicable), the SSID(s) to be merged away, the school ID to keep, the requesting LEA and a list of individuals (name and LEA) who granted permission to merge. Katrina said tickets typically take one to four hours to complete if no additional information is needed; if USBE requests more information the ticket will enter pending status and will automatically resolve after seven days unless the requester supplies the missing details.

Riley emphasized that timely responses to help‑desk queries are essential: “Please respond to comments on merge request tickets for more information in a timely manner so that ensures that your request gets done,” Riley said.

Fatal errors, warnings and courtesy reviews Calista (staff) and Stephanie (staff) described the validations that can block records. They clarified two classes of fatal errors: level‑1 fatals (errors in the LEA's data) and level‑2 fatals (errors that arise when data are checked across systems, e.g., SSID checks or district cross‑checks). Calista noted a new validation (S1Dot368) requiring district of residence to be present and two new level‑2 validations that are now fatal: district of residence and invalid address.

USBE will run courtesy data reviews beginning the week of May 27 and expects to complete reviews by June 6. Reviews will be prioritized in the order LEAs finish their school year (USBE uses calendar submissions in Data Gateway to determine that order). The review letter will flag items that need verification and list items for information only.

Common checks LEAs should make before finalizing USBE staff listed high‑priority checks for LEAs: - Fix fatal errors and investigate warnings; do not alter accurate data merely to clear warnings. - Verify enrollment and membership counts, average daily membership, and counts by grade. Most students should show about 180 membership days; unexpectedly low maximum membership counts may indicate SIS reporting problems. - Review kindergarten type codes (full‑day FN vs. half‑day NN) used in WPU funding calculations and correct any large or unexpected shifts from prior years. - Review incident reporting (disciplinary removals, SRO/LEO activity, bullying/cyberbullying/hazing/retaliation). USBE’s review threshold is low (roughly one incident per 50 students) and underreporting can affect risk scores and indicators in accountability reviews.

Kindergarten test and early numeracy requirements Maureen, in assessment, said that kindergarten Acadience (reading-on‑grade‑level) status and early numeracy results are required this year for status and intervention for BOY/MOY/EOY assessment sessions. If an LEA cannot submit kindergarten intervention and status data through UTracks, USBE assessment staff will accept a limited, provided template (MoveIT upload) for kindergarten only; grade 1–3 data must continue to flow via UTracks. Stephanie and Maureen warned that leaving required k status or intervention blank for a kindergarten student with at least 20 days of membership will trigger a fatal error and block that student record from year‑end submission.

Graduation coding and special education flags USBE staff also walked through exit and completion codes that affect cohorts and graduation rates, including new and less‑used codes (AS for adult education with an active IEP, IB for International Baccalaureate completers, RA/GA for 1% alternate diploma pathways). Cliff (staff) and others urged LEAs to finalize accurate exit codes now where possible to avoid submitting historical updates after the rollover.

District‑of‑residence validation fix Cliff reported USBE has identified a caching issue that produced some false positive district‑of‑residence errors. He said IT is clearing caches and rolling fixes in batches; some LEAs have already seen fixes and USBE expects to complete the rollout early the following week. If an LEA still sees a district‑of‑residence discrepancy after the rollout, USBE asked the LEA to open a help‑desk ticket so developers can investigate.

Resources and next steps USBE staff reiterated that LEAs can request a prioritized courtesy review by emailing datastatisticshelp@school.schools.utah.gov, and that technical help with Utrecs submissions should be addressed via the help desk. Staff said a June training will focus on the technical steps to finalize in Utrecs. Several staff offered direct follow‑up: Riley and Mark put contact details in the chat for LEAs interested in early adoption pilots for Student Backpack APIs and other integrations.

Ending USBE said it will share slides, review letters and a recording of the webinar with attendees and follow up at a June meeting before the July year‑end finalization deadline.