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I am an equal partner with school staff in planning my child's IEP

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I am an equal partner with school staff in planning my child's IEP

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a. create an agenda for the IEP meeting

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Resources to support engaging families in literacy

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WSPEI Federal Indicator 8 Support Information

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WSPEI Federal Indicator 8 Support Information

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Create a new document and edit with others at the same time -- from your computer, phone or tablet. Get stuff done with or without an internet connection. Use Docs to edit Word files. Free from Google.

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Indicator 8 FAQs

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Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction

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General Information

Question 1: Who should we contact at DPI for help?

For general questions and questions regarding survey manager technical assistance, please contact the Special Education Team.

Question 2: How do we know if our LEA (district) is required to conduct a Family Engagement Survey to collect the data for Indicator 8?

For the current school Year: A cohort of LEAs (districts) will be required to conduct the Indicator 8 Family Engagement Survey, as well as Indicator 11 (Timely Initial Evaluations) and Indicator 14 (Post School Outcomes survey). Districts selected for conducting the survey in the current year are notified of their participation by mail and the complete list of districts conducting the survey is posted to the DPI web site. Contact the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction, if you have questions about your participation in the current school year.

Question 4: What is the Indicator 8 Family Engagement Survey Manager application?

Beginning in 2015-16, a new web-based survey management tool was created and improved upon in 2020-21. The Indicator 8 Family Engagement Survey Manager, was created for LEAs (school districts) to create and send parent letters, access surveys, and monitor the Indicator 8 survey and response rate data. LEAs should not enter the survey manager or update the student list prior to the survey window opening. LEAs must activate the survey for their parents by entering the application, providing at least one district contact and reviewing the student list for your LEA (students can be added if needed). Once the LEA activates the survey, the LEA is able to download their student list, add or remove students, add a link for district level optional survey, download paper surveys, customize a DPI-provided parent letter, send parent letters as emails or download them as PDF's, and view real time response rate data (under Student Tab).

Question 5: How do I access the Indicator 8: Family Engagement Survey Manager application?

The Indicator 8: Family Engagement Survey Manager application can only be accessed through Special Education Web Portal through WI DPI's WISEhome Information Page. Click on WISEhome and use your WAMS ID and password to log into the Special Education Web Portal. Within the first table on the Main Menu of the Special Education Web Portal, select the "Setup Survey" or "Collect Responses" link in the "Required Action" column for the "Indicator 8: Family Engagement Survey Manager" application. Both the "Setup Survey" and "Collect Responses" links will bring you into the Family Engagement Survey Manager application.

Note: This Special Education Web Portal may have permissions for administrators and administrative staff. However, only the Pupil Services / Special Education Director has initial access to the Indicator 8 Survey Manager until they grant access to other users through the Special Education Web Portal. Thus, the Indicator 8: Family Engagement Survey Manager application will not appear for anyone except the Special Education / Pupil Services Director until that person grants access to the application to other users in the district.

Question 6: Who can access the Indicator 8 Survey Manager?

The Indicator 8 Survey Manager was developed for LEA (district) Pupil Services / Special Education Directors and/or their designees to use for survey management. The Pupil Services / Special Education Director can grant access to a designee through the Special Education Web Portal. For questions on accessing the Survey Manager, please contact the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction.

Who Should Receive the Family Engagement Survey?

Question 8: What if a student is missing from the survey spreadsheet AND/OR the LEA (district) wants to add students so additional families can take the survey?

It is up to the LEA if they wish to add a student manually to the student list through the Indicator 8 Family Engagement Survey Manager. It is recommended that the LEA adds students to the list prior to activating the survey. For eligible students, the Survey Manager will generate two survey code (username and password) for the student. The student must meet all of the following criteria to be eligible to be added:

The student associated with the WISEID is currently enrolled at a school in your LEA in WISEdata;

The student is aged 17 or younger as of February 15 of the current year; and

The student has not already been added to the list.

Question 9: Can a student be excluded from the spreadsheet by the LEA (district)?

Students can be excluded from the survey prior to survey activation. A reason must be provided. Questions 9 through 13 below provide guidance on situations when a student can and can NOT be excluded from the spreadsheet. Most common situations when a student can be excluded include parentally placed private school students, students dismissed from special education in previous school year, and students who left the district and the LEA does not have a forwarding address.

Question 10: What if a student on the list moved out of the district, was an out of district placement by the IEP team, or graduated?

If the student moved or was placed in an out of district placement by the IEP team during this school year and you have the parent's current address, send the letter.

If the student graduated or moved out of the district before this school year, do NOT send the letter to the parent. Keep a record of parents who were deleted from the mailing so that you will not follow up with those parents when given unused codes/usernames. If you review your student list prior to activating the survey, you can exclude the student from the survey (write "graduated" or "moved and no address" as the reason which must be provided).

Question 16: To which parent should we send the letter if there are two parents who are divorced, both with educational rights?

Send a letter to each parent. There is now a Username1 and a Username2 field in the spreadsheet that is downloaded from the Indicator 8 Family Engagement Survey Manager. The single family form letter can be used to send letters to the first parent (using Username1) and the second parent form letter can be used to send letters to the second parent. The downloadable Student List spreadsheet only has space for one parent name, so save a second copy of the spreadsheet or add another column to the spreadsheet for the second parent's name.

Question 19: Can the LEA (district) email parents their username and passwords for the survey?

LEAs may email the parent, however, each parent must use the assigned username/password to be able to take the survey. Thus, the LEA would have to ensure each parent received their own individual username/password to be able to take the Family Engagement Survey (e.g. by using Microsoft Word Mail Merge for email messages). In addition, LEAs would need to ensure student confidentiality for any electronic communications. If parents request a letter explaining the survey and including their username and password, this should be provided to the parent.

If the district elects to send the survey via email to all parents and an email is not available or the email is returned undeliverable, then the district must send a paper letter to those parents to ensure they are able to take the survey.

Question 20: Where can I find the downloadable spreadsheet sent by DPI containing student information used to merge the letters to families letting them know that they are participating in the Family Engagement Survey?

The Indicator 8 Student List is available through the Indicator 8 Family Engagement Survey Manager. You must activate the survey for your LEA before you able to download the spreadsheet. If you are unable to locate the spreadsheet in the Family Engagement Survey Manager application, please contact the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction.

After Parents Receive the Letter

Question 24: A parent called because his username and password is not working. We tried it and get the message "Invalid username or password."

1. Ensure you have activated the survey for your district. The Required Action column in the Special Education Web Portal should display "Collect Responses" and the Survey Collection Status box on the Indicator 8 Family Engagement Survey Manager home page should be set to "Survey Open".

2. If the survey is active, ask the parent if they would like to complete the survey over the phone with someone from the district that does not work directly with the child or with a WSPEI or WI FACETS staff member. Another option is to mail a paper survey to the parent that they fill out and send directly to DPI. If the parent want to take the survey over the phone and the person entering the survey does not work directly with the student, try the username and password. If none of these options work, call (608) 266-1781 or contact the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction and report the problem.

Question 27: What are different ways that parents can take the survey?

Parents may complete a survey using one of the methods below:

1. Computer - If a computer is available to parents, please instruct them to go to the Special Education Family Engagement Survey page (https://dpi.wi.gov/sped/families/parent-survey) and complete the online survey by June 30. They will enter the username and password given to them in the letter you have mailed.

2. Phone - Parents may call the school district, a WSPEI CESA Family Engagement Coordinator or WI FACETS and a staff member will read the questions to the parent and type their answers into a computer. To identify your WSPEI CESA Family Engagement Coordinator and find their contact information go to http://wspei.org/contact/. You can contact a WI FACETS staff member at (877) 374-0511.

3. Paper survey - Parents may call their School District before June 15 and ask for a paper copy to be mailed to them. Paper surveys must be generated and printed by the District through the Indicator 8 Survey Manager application and must be returned directly to WI DPI using a self-addressed stamped envelope.

Schools may also invite parents to complete the survey in a computer lab at a school, ask parents to complete the survey after IEP meetings, or invite parents to take the survey after other school events (parent nights, report card pickup, etc).

Question 28: Can the LEA (district) enter in paper surveys for the family into the online survey web portal?

Starting in 2019, district staff may NOT enter paper surveys to ensure confidentiality of the student and family. Paper surveys should be mailed to DPI and parents provided with a DPI addressed stamped envelope when given a paper survey. WSPEI CESA Family Engagement Coordinators may be available to help support data entry for the Family Engagement Survey. To contact a WSPEI coordinator go to https://wspei.org/contact/.

Following Up

Question 30: What are some options for improving response rates?

The LEA can access the Indicator 8 Family Engagement Survey Manager and view real-time response rates at any time. LEAs can also navigate to the Student List page of the Family Engagement Survey Manager and filter their student list to only those codes that are Unused. LEAs may send out reminder letters to parents, call parents, or request the help of a WSPEI Family Engagement Coordinator to contact parents. Someone at the LEA should be assigned to monitor survey response rates to ensure high response rates (minimum of 10% and at least 6 respondents, whichever is greater). In order to be counted as a response, more than 50 percent of the survey questions must be answered (12 questions). LEAs should plan on multiple methods for follow up and include at least two attempts.

Question 32: How does an LEA (district) know if their survey response rate met the required minimum? If the LEA reaches the minimum but would like to keep trying to increase its response rate, would it have access to the information needed to continue?

DPI must submit to the US Department of Education Office of Special Education Programs the representation of parents surveyed based on race and disability impairment area to ensure equitable responses to the survey. Districts are able to identify in the survey management system if they have equitable representation of responses across race and disability impairment identification and follow up as needed to ensure equitable responses across student demographics in their district.

The Survey Manager allows districts to view real time access to response rate data. Keep in mind that there will always be extra time involved for DPI to receive and enter paper survey results. Once the LEA activates the survey, there is a Response Summary section added to the bottom of the home page. The Response Rate Met column will be a red "X" until the minimum number of responses has been received. At that time, the Response Rate Met column will change to a green checkmark. At the end of the survey window, any LEA that did not have at least 10% of its sample returned, or 6 surveys, whichever is greater (the number in the Required Responses column of the Response Summary section of the home page), must follow up with the parents who have usernames and passwords that were not returned through the end of the survey window. In the Survey Manager, parent usernames and passwords that were not returned will be available to LEAs so they can follow up with additional letters, phone calls, or electronic communication.

LEAs are encouraged to continue their follow-up even if they have reached the minimum response rate requirement. LEAs that have no surveys returned in the final weeks of the survey window may be contacted individually by DPI.

Note: We added a "Responses Distribution" button to the "District Home" page. That button opens a pop-up window that shows these columns:

1. The number of students total and, in each race, ethnic group and disability category who have IEPs and are pulled into the application.

2. The target number of responses based on the 10% goal (rounded to the nearest student).

3. The parental responses collected so far.

4. The response rate (col C/col A).

5. "Percent of target" (col C/col B) which will be 100% for each category for whom exactly the number of target responses were received in a category.

Question 35: What data from our LEA (district) will be reported back to the LEA?

DPI provides question by question reports to each LEA who has at least 6 responses to the survey. The question by question reports are available for both preschool and school age surveys. Each report includes the number of parents that responded to the survey for that age group and the percent of parents who agreed with each item on the survey. If there are fewer than 6 responses for either age group, the LEA does not get a detailed report for that age group because parents are promised confidentiality of responses.

Starting in 2015-2016, parents can also submit comments at the end of the survey and can choose whether those comments are sent to their Director of Special Education / Pupil Services Director. If you had a parent that chose to share comments, a report of those comments will be available in the Family Engagement Survey Manager after the close of the survey.

Question 36: How and when will LEAs receive their individual reports and how does the public get information about individual district Family Engagement Survey reports?

Reports are made available through the Special Education Web Portal that can be accessed by the district Special Education Director through WI DPI's WISEhome Information Page. Publicly available, i.e. redacted, Indicator 8 reports are available as well through the Special Education District Profile. LEAs will be notified by e-mail that their reports are available through the Special Education Web Portal and when the public profiles are posted. To access public indicator 8 district question by question reports, click on the special education district profiles link, choose the district (LEA), and scroll down to Indicator 8. If you do not see a report listed, you can contact DPI. Some districts may not have reports available if they had fewer than 6 respondents to either a preschool age or school age survey.

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Indicator 8 Family Engagement Survey Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

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You may search this page by General Information, Generating Parent Letters, Who Should Receive a Letter, After Parents Receive Letter, Follow Up, and Data Reports General Information Question 1: Who should we contact at DPI for help? For general questions and questions regarding survey manager technical assistance, please contact the Special Education Team.

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Opti-In Option
DPI has an Opt-In option available for all districts to utilize if they would like to have families in their district complete the Indicator 8 Survey during any year when the survey window is open.  Please refer to your Special Education portal for more information

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Developing Positive Relationships with Families

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Developing Positive Relationships with Families

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20 Tips for Developing Positive Relationships With Parents

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Blogger Elena Aguilar shares 20 tips to help teachers better connect with parents.

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WSPEI CCR-IEP Family Engagement Resources Livebinder

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WSPEI CCR-IEP Family Engagement Resources Livebinder

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Copy of CCR IEP Family Engagement Resources

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CCR IEP Family Engagement Resources for school staff who are looking for ways to engage families who have a child with a disability. There are tools, lists, videos, and other resources found in this live binder.

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NCEO - National Center on Educational Outcomes

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Helping Your Child with Routines at Home

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Statewide/National Family Support and Advocacy Organizations

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Statewide/National Family Support and Advocacy Organizations

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State and Federally Funded Family Support Organizations-rev5-15-19

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wisconsin statewide parent educator initiative

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The Wisconsin Statewide Parent Educator Initiative -WSEI- helps creates partnerships between parents and school district by providing resources such as training and classes.