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School Weekly Hours: Special Education

School Weekly Hours: Special Education, Shortened School Day

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NEW for the 2025-26 School Year and Onward: Shortened School Day data elements

School Weekly Hours defines the school hours attended by the Shortened School Day student.

This numeric value should be less than/smaller than the school policy’s standard number of hours per week (i.e., instructional time).

School Weekly Hours defines the school hours attended by the Shortened School Day student.

Think of the Shortened School Day data elements as an addition equation:

School Weekly Hours + Shortened Weekly Hours Compared to Peers = Standard Peer Attendance Hours

25 hours of school per week + 5 hours less than peers attend school = 30 hours per standard school week.

 

For example, if the student's School Weekly Hours is 25 and their Shortened Weekly Hours Compared to Peers is 5, that means their peers attend 30 hours per week, or, 25 + 5 = 30.

Make sure that the value for School Weekly Hours (e.g., 25) is greater than the value for Shortened Weekly Hours Compared to Peers (e.g., 5). 25 > 5.

USES: The DPI Special Education staff use this data to identify instances where a reduced school schedule may be used inappropriately. Shortened School Day data elements are a part of Reading Drives Achievement: Procedural Compliance Self-Assessment (RDA:PCSA) by pulling data samples from the district level. Collection of Shortened Day data is necessary for implementing the department’s compliance monitoring system required under state and federal special education law. Additionally, these data elements will also be included in one of the DPI annual snapshots, however, these new data elements will not be ‘snapped’ until 2026.

 

FAQs, Details, and Use Cases

  1. Please note that these data elements should only be reported for students with shortened school day annotated as a placement in their IEP. These data elements should not be reported for students without IEPs. For example, these data elements should not be reported for high school seniors that qualify for late start and early release based on the number of credits they have earned/need to complete for graduation.

Resources

To contact the DPI Special Education staff with questions about disability data, you can     
submit a Special Education Help Ticket, or call: 1 (608) 266-1781.
 
If you need assistance from the Partner Support Team, please submit a WISE Help Ticket.
To provide feedback, click the "Submit Feedback" button.

 

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