A practical, save-worthy checklist covering every point in the school calendar where language access needs to be planned — not scrambled for. Print it, share it with your team, and use it to map your year.
Every school year has the same recurring moments where language access matters — and every year, some of them get missed simply because they weren’t mapped out ahead of time. This checklist is meant to be used, not just read: pull it out during your fall planning meeting and check off what’s already handled.
Start of year
- Back-to-School Night — interpretation for the full event, not just individual conversations
- New family enrollment and orientation sessions
- Open house events for prospective families
- Professional Development Days
- Welcome packets and enrollment forms translated into your community’s top languages
Ongoing throughout the year
- IEP meetings — every occurrence, not just the initial evaluation
- 504 plan meetings
- Parent-teacher conferences (fall and spring rounds)
- School board meetings, if LEP families are part of your district community
- PTA/PTO meetings and events
- Health and wellness workshops or family engagement nights
- Community Events
Exam and academic milestones
- Regents or state exam information sessions for families
- Standardized testing communication and consent forms
- Graduation ceremonies — the biggest single-day interpretation need most schools face
Crisis and compliance-critical moments
- Disciplinary hearings and meetings
- Special education due process proceedings
- Emergency communications — having a plan in place before it’s needed, not during a crisis
The schools that handle language access well aren’t the ones with the biggest budgets. They’re the ones who mapped the calendar before the year started.
How to actually use this list
Walk through each section with your leadership team and mark what’s already staffed, what’s unclear, and what’s missing entirely. For anything marked “unclear,” that’s usually where a scramble happens later — get clarity now while there’s no pressure attached to the decision.
If your list of events adds up to eight or more qualifying sessions across the year, it’s worth having a conversation about an annual partnership approach rather than booking everything individually.
Save this checklist, share it with whoever owns event planning at your school, and revisit it each August as your calendar firms up.
Want help mapping your specific calendar?
We’re happy to walk through this checklist with your team and talk through what an annual plan could look like for your school or network.
