Primary and Secondary Disability Data Collection and Reporting

Links are provided below to data elements collected about disability conditions affecting students receiving special education and related services.

Click on a term to see its description and uses.

Primary Disability

Secondary Disabilities

Primary Disability
See codes below.

As defined by the U.S. Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP), primary disability is the disability condition that best describes an IDEA-eligible student's impairment; the impairment that is most disabling. Students who are not IDEA-eligible or have no disability should be assigned a primary disability code of N.

USES: Primary Disability codes are used for disaggregated reporting and accountability purposes including ESEA Report Card, Adequate Yearly Progress, Wisconsin School Performance Report, and the Wisconsin Continuous Improvement and Focused Monitoring System. Primary disability codes are also used in annual data reports required under IDEA which are in turn used in reports to Congress and in state-by-state comparisons.

Secondary Disabilities
See codes below. SDD and N are not valid Secondary Disabilities codes.

Secondary Disabilities are any additional disability conditions identified by the student’s latest evaluation. An IDEA-eligible student may have one or more Secondary Disabilities or may have no Secondary Disability.

CHANGES

Secondary Disabilities are collected for the first time in ISES Year End records for 2006-07 and ISES Count Date records for 2007-08.

USES: Secondary Disability codes are used to get a full count of students with a particular disability and to determine which students meet the IDEA definition of "multiple disabilities. State level federal reporting under Section 618 or the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act uses the disability category "multiple disabilities" in addition to the disability categories provided below.

An "IDEA Eligible" student must meet all the following requirements:

Be a child age 3-21 years of age, who has not graduated with a diploma from high school.
Be a child with an impairment(s), who because of that impairment(s) needs special education and related services as determined by a current evaluation and a current individualized education program (IEP) or a services plan for parentally placed private school children.
The student is attending and receiving all of the services specified in the IEP/service plan.
The student is receiving a free appropriate public education (FAPE) or is a parentally placed private school student receiving special education or related services that meet state standards under a service plan (34 CFR 300.452--300.462).

A "Not IDEA Eligible" student would include:

A student between the ages of birth and 3 or age 22 and older who is receiving services from the school district.
A student without a current evaluation or IEP.
A student who is not receiving special education and related services, as specified in the IEP.
A student who is not attending school, except for an excused absence or illness; e.g., a student whose whereabouts is unknown but who has not exited.
A student who is in the process of expulsion and is not being served.
A student who has received a high school diploma but is still receiving services.

The above requirements are applied as of a specific date, based on the most current data available. For ISES count date records, that date is the count date. For ISES year end records, that date is the exit date from the school or the end of the school term whichever occurs first.

CODES

Disability	Code	Description/Comments
Autism	A	Autism means a developmental disability significantly affecting a child’s social interaction and verbal and nonverbal communication, generally evident before age 3, that adversely affects learning and educational performance. Other characteristics often associated with autism are engagement in repetitive activities and stereotyped movements, resistance to environmental change or change in daily routines, and unusual responses to sensory experiences. The term does not apply if a child's educational performance is adversely affected primarily because the child has an emotional disturbance, as defined in sub. (7). [Wis. Admin. Code , s. PI 11.36(8)]
Cognitive Disability	CD	Cognitive disability means significantly subaverage intellectual functioning that exists concurrently with deficits in adaptive behavior and that adversely affects educational performance. [Wis. Admin. Code, s. PI 1.36(1)]
Deaf-Blind	DB	Deaf-Blind means concomitant hearing and visual impairments, the combination of which causes such severe communication and other developmental and educational needs that they cannot be accommodated in special education programs solely for children with deafness or children with blindness. [34 CFR 300.8(c)(2)]
Emotional Behavioral Disability	EBD	Emotional behavioral disability, pursuant to s. 115.76(5)(a)5., Stats., means social, emotional or behavioral functioning that so departs from generally accepted, age appropriate ethnic or cultural norms that it adversely affects a child’s academic progress, social relationships, personal adjustment, classroom adjustment, self-care or vocational skills. [Wis. Admin. Code PI 11.36(7)]
Hearing Impairment	H	Hearing Impairment, including deafness, means a significant impairment in hearing, with or without amplification, whether permanent or chronically fluctuating, that significantly adversely affects a child’s educational performance including academic performance, speech perception and production, or language and communication skills. [Wis. Admin. Code PI 11.36(4)]
Specific Learning Disability	LD	Specific learning disability, pursuant to s. 115.76(5)(a)10., Stats., means a severe learning problem due to a disorder in one or more of the basic psychological processes involved in acquiring, organizing or expressing information that manifests itself in school as an impaired ability to listen, reason, speak, read, write, spell or do mathematical calculations, despite appropriate instruction in the general education curriculum. Specific learning disability may include conditions such as perceptual disability, brain injury, minimal brain dysfunction, dyslexia and developmental aphasia. [Wis. Admin. Code PI 11.36(6)]
Other Health Impairment	OHI	Other Health Impairment means having limited strength, vitality or alertness, due to chronic or acute health problems. The term includes but is not limited to a heart condition, tuberculosis, rheumatic fever, nephritis, asthma, sickle cell anemia, hemophilia, epilepsy, lead poisoning, leukemia, diabetes, or acquired injuries to the brain caused by internal occurrences or degenerative conditions which adversely affects a child’s educational performance. [Wis. Admin. Code PI 11.36(10)]
Orthopedic Impairment	OI	Orthopedic Impairment means a severe orthopedic impairment that adversely affects a child's educational performance. The term includes, but is not limited to, impairments caused by congenital anomaly, such as clubfoot, or absence of some member; impairments caused by disease, such as poliomyelitis or bone tuberculosis; and impairments from other causes, such as cerebral palsy, amputations, and fractures or burns that cause contractures. [Wis. Admin. Code PI 11.36(2)]td>
Speech or Language Impairment	SL	Speech or Language Impairment means an impairment of speech or sound production, voice, fluency, or language that significantly affects educational performance or social, emotional or vocational development. [Wis. Admin. Code PI 11.36(5)]
Traumatic Brain Injury	TBI	Traumatic Brain Injury means an acquired injury to the brain caused by an external physical force resulting in total or partial functional disability or psychosocial impairment, or both, that adversely affects a child's educational performance. The term applies to open or closed head injuries resulting in impairments in one or more areas, such as cognition; speech and language; memory; attention; reasoning; abstract thinking; communication; judgment; problem-solving; sensory, perceptual and motor abilities; psychosocial behavior; physical functions; information processing; and executive functions, such as organizing, evaluating and carrying out goal-directed activities. The term does not apply to brain injuries that are congenital or degenerative, or brain injuries induced by birth trauma. [Wis. Admin. Code PI 11.36(9)]
Visual Impairment	V	Visual Impairment means even after correction a child’s visual functioning significantly adversely affects his or her educational performance. [Wis. Admin. Code PI 11.36(3)]td>
Significant Developmental Delay	SDD	Significant developmental delay means children, ages 3, 4 and 5 years of age or below compulsory school attendance age, who are experiencing significant delays in the areas of physical, cognition, communication, social-emotional or adaptive development. All other suspected impairments under this section shall be considered before identifying a child’s primary impairment as significant developmental delay. [Wis. Admin. Code PI 11.36(11)]
Not IDEA Eligible or No Disability	N

ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS ABOUT PRIMARY DISABILITY AND SECONDARY DISABILITIES

The above criteria are applied as of a specific date, based on the most current data available. For ISES count date records, that date is the count date. For ISES year end records, that date is the exit date from the school or the end of the school term whichever occurs first. Count date and ISES year end records should reflect the appropriate disability status as of these specific dates.
According to Sec. 602 of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act of 2004, the term `free appropriate public education' means special education and related services that (A) have been provided at public expense, under public supervision and direction, and without charge; (B) meet the standards of the State educational agency; (C) include an appropriate preschool, elementary school, or secondary school education in the State involved; and (D) are provided in conformity with the individualized education program required under section 614(d).
If a student is identified with a primary disability of Significant Developmental Delay (SDD) and turns 6 years old on or before September 1, the LEA may not count the student for the Part B child count as SDD. If the student's primary disability is SDD and the student turns 6 years old on or after September 2, the LEA may designate SDD as the primary disability for the Part B child count for that school year. However, prior to the start of the next school year, the IEP team must convene to determine whether or not the child has an educational disability under one of the other primary disability categories and continues to have a need for special education services.
Primary and Secondary Disability cannot be the same.
Neither CD/LD nor LD/CD can be used as a Primary/Secondary Disability combination.
PI-2197: IDEA Federal Student Data Collection was replaced by ISES beginning in 2007-08.
Students identified as eligible for protection under Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act (34 CFR 104) but who are not IDEA-eligible should be assigned a primary disability code of N.