Track special education deadlines with Google Sheets, Gmail, Calendar, and DeepSeek

Special education deadlines do not move, and the paperwork that keeps them moving is easy to lose in a spreadsheet. This workflow reads the caseload ledger every morning, works out each legal date from its own anchor, and puts the overdue cases, the drafted parent notices and the Monday board in front of the people who need them.

Last updated: November 2026.

Quick Overview

Every morning at 07:00 the workflow reads the Caseload ledger from Google Sheets and computes each legal date from its anchor date plus the days that deadline type allows. Anything past its legal date is escalated to the compliance lead in one email. Deadlines inside their lead window go to an AI assistant that drafts a parent meeting notice and a case manager prep checklist per student, emails the worklist and drops a meeting hold on the school calendar. Two hosted forms keep the ledger honest: one starts a new clock, one records the outcome after the meeting. A Monday board summarises the caseload.

How it works

1. The 07:00 Daily Compliance Sweep reads A1:N200 of the Caseload tab.
2. Compute Deadline Risk turns each row into a legal date and a start-by date using the lead table: annual review 365 days with a 30 day lead, triennial reevaluation 1095 with 90, progress report 90 with 14, initial evaluation 60 with 14, comparable services for a transfer student 30 with 7, and the transfer of rights notice 365 with 60. Rows already held or filed are marked done, and an unknown deadline type is marked unsupported instead of guessed.
3. Overdue Deadlines? sends anything past its legal date to Build Overdue Alert, which lists the student, the deadline type, the legal date, the days past due and the owner, then emails the compliance lead.
4. In Action Window? routes deadlines that are inside their lead window to Build Upcoming Worklist, which builds a per student prompt.
5. Draft Notices And Checklists returns strict JSON per student with a notice subject, a parent notice and a prep checklist, and is told never to invent a citation and never to give legal advice.
6. Parse Drafted Notices assembles one email with a block per student, Email Worklist To Case Manager sends it, and Create Meeting Hold Event holds the earliest start-by date on the calendar.
7. New Deadline Form logs a triggered clock (consent signed, transfer enrollment, parent request), computes the legal date and appends the row. Deadline Outcome Form records the held date and the filed date as separate states and recomputes the next annual date.
8. Every Monday at 08:00 Build Board Summary recounts the ledger and an AI assistant writes the caseload board email.

Setup

1. Create a Google Sheets ledger with a Caseload tab using the columns the nodes read: student_id, student_initials, grade, program, deadline_type, anchor_date, legal_due, start_by, status, held_date, filed_date and owner_email.
2. Connect your Google Sheets account on the four sheet nodes and pick that spreadsheet.
3. Connect Gmail on the six email nodes, and set the case manager and compliance lead addresses on the worklist and escalation emails.
4. Connect Google Calendar on Create Meeting Hold Event and choose which calendar holds the meeting windows.
5. Add your AI credential on Notices Model and Board Model.
6. Share both hosted forms with the front office, and send one test row through New Deadline Form to watch the legal date land on the ledger.
7. Change the lead days per deadline type at the top of Compute Deadline Risk if your state uses different windows.

Quick Answers

Who decides that a deadline is late?
The code, not the model. Compute Deadline Risk compares the computed legal date with today, and the AI only drafts the notice and the board wording from the numbers it is handed.

What is a lead window?
Every deadline type has a lead time in days. Once the start-by date arrives the case is in the action window, which is when the workflow drafts the parent notice and the calendar hold.

What happens after the meeting?
The Deadline Outcome Form records the held date and the filed date as separate states and recomputes the next annual date from the meeting date.

Can I add my own deadline types?
Yes. Extend the lead table at the top of Compute Deadline Risk, and the matching table in the other code nodes, with your own type key and day count.

Additional info

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