Upload the IEP. Everything else builds itself.
Drop in the IEP PDF and lightningSPED extracts the goals, services, profile, and contacts — plus a one-page at-a-glance your whole team can actually use. No re-typing.
PDF to caseload in minutesIEPs · Compliance · Progress monitoring
Less paperwork. More presence.
For SPED teams buried under IEP paperwork and compliance admin, lightningSPED puts the whole caseload in one place — so the administrative work stops stealing time from the students who need you most. It's in Washington classrooms today.
If this sounds familiar
You didn't become a SPED teacher to do paperwork.
- You're prepping for an IEP meeting at 10 p.m. because there was no time during the day between pulling kids for services, covering a para shortage, and responding to three parent emails.
- Your paras are collecting goal data on sticky notes and clipboards — and turning it into progress reports is your weekend project.
- You're toggling between four systems that weren't built for special ed — and none of them talk to each other.
- A compliance deadline slipped last month and the guilt is still sitting in your chest. You care. There's just too much.
What it does
The admin side of SPED
just got fast.
Four tools, built specifically for the SPED workflow. No bloat. No "try to make general edtech fit your world." Just the work, done.
Deadlines that never sneak up.
Every annual review, reevaluation, and consent deadline tracked in one place — with real school-day math, so the date you see is the date that counts.
Airtight audit trailData collection that doesn't interrupt teaching.
Tap-to-log goal data in the moment. Charts generate themselves. Quarterly reports stop being a weekend project.
Works offlineParas collect. Case managers review. Directors see it all.
Paraeducators log data on iPad, case managers review and follow up, and directors see the whole roster's compliance picture — everyone working from the same live view.
See each role ↓Who it's for
Every seat
at the IEP table.
Special ed is a team sport. lightningSPED gives each role its own view of the same live record and provides the tools specific to each role. Each job actually made easier and built by the ones who know the work best.
Web
Case managers
- Upload the IEP once. Goals, services, profile, contacts, and a one-page at-a-glance come out the other side.
- Your caseload's clocks in one place. Annual reviews, reevals, and consent deadlines in real school-day math.
- Para data comes back to you. Review what was collected, confirm mastery, and read their notes without chasing anyone down.
- Progress reports build from data that's already there. Charts included. No weekend required.
iPad
Paraeducators
- Pick your name, enter your PIN, go. Shared classroom iPads unlock in seconds — no password dance between groups.
- Big targets, one thing in focus. Trials, timed probes, behavior tallies, task-analysis steps — each gets the capture screen it needs.
- The how-to is one tap away. The intervention's guide and the student's IEP at-a-glance live on the device, so nothing runs from memory.
- Leave a note for the case manager or a handoff for whoever's next. Keep a private scratchpad that never leaves the iPad.
- Works offline. Log in the hallway, the gym, the portable. It syncs when you're back.
Web
Directors
- Every student, every school, every case manager on one roster — annual review and reeval dates on the row, meeting load by week.
- "Needs you" comes to you. Overdue clocks, unassigned students, and this week's meetings surface on your home screen, not in an email from a teacher.
- Set the policy once. Your family-notice and report-delivery lead times, counted on your own school calendar, drive every date in the district.
- Run the district, not the software. Add students before the first IEP lands, assign case managers, provision staff, enroll and revoke shared iPads — and delegate any slice of it without handing over the keys.
Web
Eval team
- The window starts at consent. Record the consent date and the evaluation deadline is counted in school days off your calendar — Washington's 35-day rule, built in.
- Chase consent without a sticky note. Track the request you're still waiting on, get a follow-up reminder, and log the day it comes back.
- Two clocks, tracked separately. The annual IEP and the reevaluation are different legal deadlines, and a waiver on one never hides the other.
- See every record. Touch only yours. Read any student district-wide, join a case team, and run your own interventions alongside the IEP without editing it.
Same record · Same dates · Four views
What we believe
Not built for SPED teachers.
Built with them.
Every feature, every flow, every word — shaped by the people actually doing the work.
Why lightningSPED
Built for SPED. Not adapted. Not retrofitted.
Generic edtech
- —Built for general ed, bolted onto SPED as an afterthought
- —IEP templates are dropdowns in a form
- —Compliance is your problem to track
- —Works like enterprise software from 2009
- —Data collection means clipboards and re-entry
lightningSPED
- ✦Built alongside SPED teachers from day one
- ✦Upload the IEP once — goals and services extract themselves
- ✦Compliance is automatic and audit-ready
- ✦Feels like momentum, not homework
- ✦Paras tap-to-log on iPad, online or off
Your students
need you back.
lightningSPED is live in Washington schools, and we're bringing new schools on in waves. Drop your email and we'll reach out when we can bring yours aboard.