Production Simulation

CARES SPOCs, CARES Technical Contacts, Implementation Coordinators, OCM Coordinators, County Leadership, Tribe Leadership, Probation Leadership, and State Leadership:

We want to share an important update on the CWS-CARES Train-the-Trainer (TTT) schedule, to support county requests for more preparation time and ensure seamless training experiences. TTT will now be conducted from July 20 to August 28, 2026 (shifted from the original July 6 - August 14 timeline).

Why We Are Making the Adjustment

More Prod Sim Time: Counties need more time in the Prod Sim environment for their users to complete prerequisites and build system familiarity while data scenarios and bugs are finalized.

Improved Environment Stability: It allows time to resolve open bugs, interface readiness, and data load issues to minimize training disruptions.

Better Timing: This shortens the gap between TTT, Instructor-Led Training (ILT), and Go-Live, boosting knowledge retention. We are currently analyzing its potential impact on ILT dates.

What Is Next

CWS-CARES Training Coordinators will contact Organization Training Coordinators directly to share specific TTT dates and registration details for each organization.

Next week we will share detailed preparation steps, including prerequisites, recommended enablement program sequencing, and environment access confirmations.

Thank you for your flexibility and your continued partnership as we prepare for a successful rollout.

Action Required

If you have questions about how this impacts your training plan or prerequisites, please connect with your training coordinator or CWDS Training.

CARES SPOCs, CARES Technical Contacts, Implementation Coordinators, OCM Coordinators, County Leadership, Tribe Leadership, Probation Leadership, and State Leadership:

We are sharing an important update regarding the CWS-CARES Production Simulation (Prod Sim) and other environments as we track toward our CWS-CARES Version 1 Go-Live on October 26, 2026.

CWS-CARES Prod Sim (CARES 100) will be continuously enhanced with planned, coordinated releases leading up to the October Go-Live. The final CWS-CARES V1 Production environment will reflect the latest code deployed in Prod Sim; consequently, Prod Sim's exact features will evolve over the coming months.

A primary objective of Prod Sim is to validate system functionality in place of a traditional pilot, ensuring that the statewide deployment of CWS-CARES maintains our commitment to child safety. Prod Sim provides the most accurate, up-to-date representation of the system available. We recommend that organizations actively utilize Prod Sim to support readiness and enable staff to test and validate. Please note that while Prod Sim reflects the core design, we are continuously fixing defects ahead of launch. Detailed communications will be shared by July 6 to outline the exact features and fixes included in the V1 release versus those scheduled for post-Go-Live.

Attached to this email is a detailed document outlining the current capabilities, limitations, and system status as of June 22, 2026, for CWS-CARES Prod Sim and other environments. This resource is designed to provide clarity on what to expect, what has changed, and how to understand the current system behavior.

Please note that the attachment is a living document. We will refresh this framework regularly, with the next updates scheduled for July 6 and August 4.

The attached document covers:

Prod Sim

1. June 22^nd User Onboarding & Objectives: An overview of the June 22 Production Simulation onboarding group, their designated objectives, and the schedule for subsequent July onboarding. This includes a summary of the adjustments made to the original onboarding requests and the plan forward.
2. Known & Expected Issues, Current System Behavior: Highlights of known and expected issues, and current system behaviors users might encounter, focusing primarily on data-related issues.
3. Resolved Issues: A summary of resolved bugs and defects. Users should report these if any unexpected behavior persists within these specific areas.
4. Open/Reported Issues, Capabilities Not Available on June 22: A generalized overview of current Prod Sim issues classified by subject area; please note this does not represent the entirety of all reported active issues.
5. Forms Status: A dedicated status update on the readiness and functionality of project forms.

Environment Specifications

• We are sharing information on the current operational status and specifications of the CWS-CARES environments including the configuration, data sets, access rights, and feature availability.

We acknowledge how critical these environment insights are to your planning, and we remain fully committed to partnering with you to ensure a smooth transition. We will continue to keep you informed with our next update scheduled for July 6. Thank you for your ongoing commitment to preparing your teams for the V1 Go-Live.

Action Required

No action is required.

Please contact Customer Relations for questions: CWS_CustRel@otsi.ca.gov