Sent: Wednesday, August 11, 2010 11:00 AM To: Open Enrollment Coordinators and OPAL Contacts From: Mary Jo Cleaver, Open Enrollment Consultant Subject: OPAL and Getting Ready for Making Entries for 2010-11 School Year Sometime between today and September 1, OPAL will “roll over” for the 2010-11 school year. I will send a list serve notice when that happens. Until then: --You cannot at this time withdraw students who do not plan to open enroll in the 2010-11 school year. Instead, you must wait until OPAL rolls over and then report them as not OE on the third Friday in September. --If an already open enrolled student has moved into a different resident school district and is planning to continue open enrollment, you can make this entry in OPAL now as follows: Click on the student’s name. Click on Change Parent/Addr. Enter the new address (mailing and street address) and Save. Then click on Change Enrollment. Enter a new resident district for “next” year (which at this time means the 2010-11 school year) and Save. This will send an email to the old and new resident districts. When OPAL rolls over, the student will appear in the transfer out list for the new resident district. --If an already open enrolled student has moved into a different resident school district and will not continue open enrollment, DO NOT enter a new resident district for the student. You will simply report the student as not OE on the third Friday in September. You may, if you wish, enter the new address for the student and enter “will not continue open enrollment” in the comments section. This will send an email to the old resident district. NOTE: Be sure to SAVE all changes and entries or they will be lost. Be sure to SAVE if you will be away from the page for even a few minutes. OPAL times out after 15 minutes of no activity (entering information does not count as activity, entering SAVE counts as an activity) and any non-saved entries or changes will be lost. Once OPAL rolls over to 2010-11: --DO NOT make any resident school district changes once OPAL rolls over (unless they apply to the 2011-12 school year). Any resident district changes that apply to the 2010-11 school year must be made by me or Merry. --The Actively Open Enrolled list will initially be blank. The All Students list contains the names of all students who were open enrolled at the end of the 2009-10 school year, except seniors, AND the names of all new applicants for the 2010-11 school year. As soon as the nonresident district enters that the student is OE, the student’s name will appear on the Actively Open Enrolled list. --If a student who was a senior last year did not graduate and is still open enrolled to your district, click on Returns. A list of last year’s seniors will appear. Click on Retain and the student will show up on the All Students list. --The nonresident district can then begin entering information into the third Friday list (understanding that this information is not “complete” until the student has actually attended on the third Friday). If the third Friday entry for a student is “open enrolled”, this means that either the student was in attendance in the nonresident district as an open enrolled student on the third Friday in September or, if the student was not in attendance on the third Friday in September, was in attendance at least one day before and one day after the third Friday in September as an open enrolled student. If the student IS NOT IN ATTENDANCE on the third Friday, you must enter “not OE” or leave it blank (temporarily). If the student was in attendance at least one day before the third Friday, you can enter OE when/if the student attends school on a day after the third Friday. OPAL only cares whether the student is open enrolled. If the student is attending your district, but not as an open enrolled student, then you must indicate “Not Open Enrolled.” Be sure to SAVE. --Once the nonresident district has made its entries on the third Friday list, the nonresident district should then go to the Special Ed list. Only students who were reported as OE appear on the Special Ed list. If the student was listed as sped in the 2009-10 school year or the parent indicated on the application that the student is sped, the entry will also ready show SPED. Make any entries or changes and SAVE. --Once the nonresident district has made its entries on the third Friday and Special Ed lists, the resident district should agree or disagree with the nonresident district changes (until the nonresident district makes its entry, the open enrollment status will show on the transfer out list as n/a). (However, once the nonresident district enters OE for the student, the student appears on the Actively Open Enrolled list. Thus, even if the resident district fails to make an entry, the student is reported as OE.) If the resident district disagrees, OPAL sends an email to the nonresident district. However, there is no automatic change to OPAL if the resident district disagrees. The districts must consult and resolve the issue. If this results in a change, the nonresident district must enter the new information. Entering or changing information in the 3rd Friday and Special Ed lists does not generate an OPAL email. Thus resident districts should monitor the lists until they are frozen on October 1. Be sure to SAVE. --Districts that operate virtual charter schools must click on the Virtual tab. Only students who were reported as OE on the third Friday will appear on this list. For each student, indicate “Attending VCS” or “Not Attending VCS.” An entry must be made for every student. Do not indicate “No Answer.” This button is only intended to allow you to clear both the “Attending” and “Not Attending” buttons for the student. SAVE. --The third Friday and second Friday lists will only be active until October 1. After that you can view the lists, but you cannot make entries or changes in the lists. This does not mean that the data is frozen and cannot be changed. However, any changes after that date must be made through either the All Students list or the Actively Open Enrolled list. Click on the student’s name and the appropriate tab and make the changes. Be sure to SAVE. As always, if you have any questions, please call me or Merry (merry.larsen@dpi.wi.gov or 608-266-2146). Mary Jo Cleaver Public School Open Enrollment Consultant Department of Public Instruction 608-267-9101 or toll-free 888-245-2732 fax: 608-267-9207 email: maryjo.cleaver@dpi.wi.gov website: http://dpi.wi.gov/sms/psctoc.html