Method Advisory Group

Version 1.0. Issued 13 September 2026; adopted 20 September 2026 (LOG-001 D-025, D-026). Status: adopted. Establishes the method advisory group that reviews the frameworks and the comparison methods of the National Deaf Education Data Index and the Accessibility Governance Record, which carry identical copies of this document (GOV-005 and AGR-GOV-005). Owner's and principal's decision of 13 September 2026: the group is to be established and operating by 2028, with an interim arrangement until then.

1. Purpose

A record that documents public bodies and is funded in shares by them needs an answer to the question "who checks you" that is not the firm itself. The group is that answer. It reviews method; it does not edit files.

2. Composition

Four or five members, none employed by or under contract to Novara Consulting Group LLC or its brands, drawn so that the group holds between them: a state data administrator or state education data official; a researcher in Deaf education or in disability data; an ADA or accessibility coordinator from a public body; a public procurement officer; and a representative of the Deaf, DeafBlind, or hard-of-hearing community. At least two members are Deaf, DeafBlind, or hard of hearing. Members serve two-year terms, staggered so that no more than three terms end in one year, and may serve two terms. Members receive a fixed annual honorarium, disclosed on the funding page, and no other payment from the firm during or within twelve months after their term.

3. Establishment

Interim, from adoption to the end of 2027. An external methods reviewer, engaged for a fixed fee and disclosed, reads the comparison method and the first full rollup of each instrument before publication, and the reviewer's comments and the firm's responses are published with the rollup. Step-two review outcomes under the engagement protocol are published without an advisory view during the interim.

By 2028. The group is convened by the end of 2027, with members named and terms published on the site, and holds its first annual review in 2028. From then the interim reviewer's role passes to the group.

4. Remit

The group reviews, once a year, the principal frameworks, the coding schemes, the standing analytical constructs, and the comparison analysis protocol of each instrument, and publishes its findings; it receives the public corrections register and the annual error summary and may comment on them; it may publish a non-binding view on a step-two review outcome referred to it under the engagement protocol; and it may recommend a change to any governance document, which is taken up at that document's next version under the decision register or declined with published reasons.

5. Limits

The group has no editorial control over any state file, no access to drafts under notice beyond what the noticed body sees, no role in releases, no vote on what is in frame, and no authority over the firm's commercial decisions. Its views are advisory and published; the firm's decisions are its own and are published with reasons where they depart from the group's view.

6. Transparency and independence

Minutes of every meeting are published within thirty days. Members' appointment terms, honoraria, and any relationship with a body in frame, a State Partner, a funder, or a licensee are disclosed on the site. A member employed by a body in frame or by a partner recuses from any matter concerning that body and the recusal is minuted. A member who acquires an interest that cannot be managed by recusal resigns. The group meets at least once a year and otherwise as its chair, elected from its members, decides.

7. Relationship to other review

The group is distinct from the SLAT Index's independent review panel, whose role is evaluation of technology under that instrument's own rules; a person may serve on both only with both roles disclosed. The group does not replace the two-step review at the engagement protocol, which is a review of decisions on the record; the group reviews method.