In business and industry, data are king. Information about customers, inventory, sales, rates of return and employee turnover is crucial. Good data help determine success or failure.
Education, of course, is a different animal. Its essential product is children, who aren’t at all like mass-produced widgets or numbers on a spreadsheet. Kids are real, data are abstract—and for some educators that makes it a four-letter word.
“Not many educators buy into or pay much attention to numbers in graduate school,” says Philip A. Streifer, a former superintendent and now an associate professor of educational leadership at the University of Connecticut. “Dealing with data is a subject that makes people uncomfortable. It causes a good deal of anxiety.”
Yet the school reform movement increasingly demands just that. The call for greater accountability means administrators and teachers must show proof—tangible, statistically valid evidence—that what they are doing is working, that students are learning faster and better.
The old tools of education—intuition, teaching philosophy, personal experience—do not seem to be enough anymore. Virtually every state has put into place an assessment system intended to measure and validate student achievement and school performance.
The passage of the No Child Left Behind Act only raises the stakes further, adding new responsibilities for states, districts and schools to accurately and promptly collect, analyze and report data on student demographics and achievement. Federal law now requires annual state reports on student performance by gender, race, disability, income, migrant status and English fluency. States also must report how many students were not tested, in the same categories, and provide detailed information about the professional qualifications of those teaching the students, such as the percentage of classes taught by teachers lacking certification in their subjects.
“Right or wrong, external accountability is coming to everyone,” says Katherine Gemberling, an educational consultant and former deputy superintendent in Montgomery County, Md. “You can’t simply mandate educational quality and order up tests to make sure it happens. But the fact is, external accountability models exist because educators did not step up themselves and establish definable measurements of quality. … Educators feel compelled—they are compelled—to look at anything that will help them show they’re getting good results.”
In other words, like good businesspeople and well run companies, educators and school districts are being asked, if not expected, to prove their bottom line with hard, solid data. With passage of No Child Left Behind, school districts large and small have taken up the banner of data-driven decision making.
- From an Data Driven Districts, by Scott LaFee, The District Administrator
Karen Greenwood Henke interview: "Turning Data into Knowledge"
Here is a great resource on the use of Data in Education produced by NCREL.
Data Mentor is a tool created by the Wayne Finger-Lakes RIC that can be used by teachers to link state achievement data with instructional resources. Data Mentor links each individual perfomance indicator (PI) with a selection of instrucional materials that addresses that specific performance indicator. It also links the PI to a bank of past state test items for that item.
Regional Information Center Data Warehouses
Each RIC is responsible for collecting and storing State Testing Data and demographics for all schools in the state. This data is stored in a data warehouse. It is then transmited to the state data warehouse for reporting purposes. Many of the RIC's have created specialized reports to assist districts in using this data to improve teaching and learning in their schools. In addidion, many RICs collect student and school information beyond student test scores (for example: attendance data) so to deepen the ability of schools to make decisions that will improve teaching and learning.
Example of an innovative data warehouse application:
Some RIC's have worked with districts to create reports that attempt to identify "At Risk" students before they take their state exams. This gives districts a head start in providing these students with the support services that they need.
Port Chester City Schools - This school district used data warehousing, Data Mentor, and technology to have the HS and MS beome Blue Ribbon Schools of Excellence. Data and technology is also used in exemplary fashion at JFK Magnet School (Lou Cuglietto - Principal)
Leadership Issues for Discussion:
1. What are the key issues for creating a culture of continuous improvement?
2. How can you build trust with the staff so that they are open to discussion of classroom practices?
3. How do you create an environment of accountability without blame?
data driven decisions questionnaire.pdf
Comments (0)
You don't have permission to comment on this page.