- Open Prepare in the sidebar (/dashboard/prepare) and choose IEP progress meeting.
- Pick the student, then set the dates and who will see it (For the family or Team only).
- The strongest evidence is already ticked; untick what does not belong. Staff-only items are marked.
- Write a short summary and choose Save to My documents, then open the packet to export the PDF (PDF export is Pro or a school plan).
- About a week out, check for thin data so you still have time to record honestly or explain gaps.
Prepare is where Evident gathers a student's goals, notes, incidents, and supports into a meeting packet. For an IEP meeting, it suggests the evidence for the date range you pick, you choose what goes in, and the result is a saved packet you can export.
Start in Prepare
Open Prepare from the sidebar. The Prepare for a meeting page shows meeting types: MTSS intervention review, IEP progress meeting, Parent conference, FBA / BIP review, and Accommodations review. With a student selected, each card shows whether there is enough evidence yet.
Choose IEP progress meeting and pick the student. If you do not see Prepare in your sidebar, your school role may not include it; ask your administrator.
Set the audience and date range
In Dates and who will see it, choose For the family if the packet will go to the family or Team only if it is for staff, set the From and To dates, and choose Next: find evidence.
Packets for the family leave out staff-only material, and confidential support-team notes are never included in family-facing exports.
Choose the evidence
Evident gathers goal progress, data points, accommodations, and related notes for those dates and ticks the strongest ones. Staff-only items are marked. Keep what supports the discussion; you are building a focused packet, not attaching every log. Choose Use these to go on.
If a packet for the family leaves staff-only items out, Evident says how many, so you can switch it to Team only if they belong.
Draft the summary and save
The summary is where you explain what the data shows, what context matters, and what the team might adjust. Start from the evidence gives you a first draft to edit. AI note polish is unavailable on the EU deployment.
Save to My documents saves the summary and the packet together, and Open it to check and export the PDF takes you to the packet page. Your first documentation PDF is free; ongoing packet PDFs require Pro or a school plan. For recorded goal data, use the chart-only progress report from the Goals tab.
A week before: quick checks
Confirm the reporting window matches the meeting. Look for goals with only a few data points and weeks with no data, and note the reasons you know (testing, absence, schedule changes).
Replace opinion words with what the data shows: requested a break independently on 9 of 15 days, up from 3 the month before, rather than seems better.
Frequently asked questions
Should every daily log go in the packet?
Usually not. Keep the logs as the record, and include the items that explain the goal progress and the summary.
What if there are missing days?
Note why when you know the reason, and avoid drawing conclusions from a short window.
Can I make one version for staff and one for the family?
Yes. Build one packet for Team only and another for the family. Packets for the family can also be exported with a translation.
How early should I start?
About a week out, so there is time to record a few more days honestly or to frame a short window as preliminary.