IEPWriter.com for Pennsylvania renews SIF-certification
June 27, 2007
Leader Services, an information processing and billing company with offices nationwide, announces that IEPWriter.com™ (Pennsylvania version) and Children Count® have received Schools Interoperability Framework (SIF) certification version 1.5r1 for a third year. SIF certification indicates that the application has met stringent specifications that enable it to integrate seamlessly with other SIF-compliant applications in the education setting. Software applications must apply to be recertified every year. IEPWriter and Children Count are SIF-certified until June 30, 2008.
SIF-certified software's streamlining of data management has the potential to save State Education Agencies (SEAs) and Local Education Agencies (LEAs) time and money. SEAs and LEAs use the same data for many purposes in different systems. For example, an LEA might have different software applications for attendance, library borrowing and special education services. With SIF-certified applications, a single update to student information in one system automatically works behind the scenes to update that information in all integrated software products, reducing time spent updating records and making updated information available more quickly and efficiently.
The international Schools Interoperability Framework Association (SIFA) has released a third-party study that highlights the advantages of implementing SIF and SIF-certified applications, including dramatic improvements in data interoperability, student achievement, funding increases, and student services.
Because of the benefits to our clients, Leader has taken an active role, joining SIFA and helping to develop the specifications that the organization uses to certify software. Senior programmers Greg Blickley and Daryl Williams are members of the Special Programs Work Group (SPWG), which is responsible for maintaining and developing new data objects for the specification. According to Williams, "Having our programmers participate in this group puts Leader in a good position to ensure that the SIF specification fulfills all of the reporting requirements for our clients. The whole idea behind SIF just further enhances what we strive to do with all of our software applications -- reduce the administrative load on our clients.In the not-too-distant future, customers will want all of their applications SIF-enabled because of the advantages of having seamless data integration between disparate systems."
When asked to comment about the certification, lead SIF programmer Blickley added, "We are committed to maintaining the most up-to-date SIF certification for IEPWriter.com and to working with SIFA for the benefit of our clients."
Leader's IEPWriter.com, currently implemented in Pennsylvania and Ohio, is a secure, hosted web application for special education professionals used in over 200 LEAs to create IEPs and related special education documents (evaluation reports, letters, and more) from any computer, using common web browsers over a secure SSL connection. Features include centralized management, allowing multiple users to contribute to an IEP; a shared and customizable goals and objectives library; documents generated in PDF format; school-wide reporting; and a comprehensive form and letter-generating capability, from invitation letters to evaluation reports and more. Its Children Count module captures and tracks student and staff data to prepare statistical reports for state and federal reporting.
About Leader Services
Leader Services is a vanguard in special education software and services. Headquartered in West Hazleton, PA, with satellite offices in Alameda, Sacramento, and Temecula, CA; Harrisburg, PA; and Seattle, WA, Leader Services provides custom web-based software and information management services for school district, consortium, and state-level education clients across the country. Leader's product line includes a number of secure, web-based applications:
- IEPWriter.com, a web-based solution for generating, storing and tracking Individualized Education Programs (IEPs) which automates reporting and expedites compliance with federal and state regulations (www.iepwriter.com);
- Children Count, the IDEA Child Count data capture and reporting module of IEPWriter.com which shares IEPWriter's student and staff database and consolidates special education data capture, form generation, and reporting;
- Federal Monitor™, a web-based solution which allows states to monitor LEAs' use of federal grant funding for No Child Left Behind and other initiatives;
- ACM-on-the-Web™, a state-level IDEA compliance monitoring solution designed to assist states in meeting the needs of the Continuous Improvement and Focused Monitoring System (CIFMS), a model developed by the federal Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP) to ensure school district compliance with IDEA 04 and IDEA reauthorizations (www.acmontheweb.com);
- custom systems in multiple states for Medicaid billing for medically necessary IEP health-related services provided to MA-eligible special education students;
- and custom solutions for State Educational Agencies.
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