Published by the Alliance for Excellent Education. Nationally, and for each state, Understanding High School Graduation Rates illustrates the discrepancies in graduation rates reported by government and independent sources, examines why this is important, and describes three core policy areas that are fundamental to calculating, reporting, and improving accurate graduation rates: 1. Use of common, accurate graduation rate calculations, 2. Statewide data systems that track individual student data from the time students enter the educational system until they leave it, and 3. Policies that meaningfully hold high schools accountable for improving student achievement on test scores and increasing graduation rates so that low-performing students are not unnecessarily held back or encouraged to leave school without a diploma.
The Education Trust compiled key education facts and figures for achievement, attainment, and opportunity from elementary through college and compiled the information in state-specific reports for all 50 states.
Eleven States Join Together to Use Data and Applied Research More Effectively to Increase Community College Success - Dec 06
For the past year, teams from eleven states (CO, CT, FL, KY, LA, OH, NC, NM, TX, VA, WA) have been involved in an exciting and powerful effort to strengthen state data systems related to community college student success—and to promote better use of student outcome data for improvement and decision making at both the state and institutional level.
The Data Quality Campaign and the National Center for Educational Accountability (NCEA) conducted a survey in August 2006, with the support of The Broad Foundation and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, about state data systems to determine the number of states that have built the infrastructure to tap into the power of longitudinal data. Similar surveys were conducted by NCEA in 2003, 2004, 2005 and 2006. This website provides an overview of the findings of the survey in addition to a state-by-state analysis of the policy implications of each state's data system.
The Data Quality Campaign conducted four site visits (Florida, Utah, Virginia, Wisconsin) in order to document the common challenges and lesson learned as states design and build student-level longitudinal data systems. This report synthesizes the findings from these four visits.
Education Commission of the States updated a state status report in June 2006 of all 30 states currently creating integrated K-16, P-16, and P-20 systems.
There are a variety of initiatives occurring around the country that are focusing on improved data systems, student achievement, and the post secondary success of students. Click here for a list of initiatives and the states that are participating in them. Please contact Nancy Smith to add other activities to the list.
The 2006-2007 school year is the first in which every single student in the state's school system, more than 740,000 in K-12, will get a random 12-digit number, allowing them to be tracked from school to school, year after year, throughout the state. Individual schools and districts across Alabama have had student identification numbers for years, but this is the first time the numbers will be issued by the state.
Mercury News editorial from San Jose regarding a bill which would provide funds for training and data collections for CALPADS (California Longitudinal Pupil Achievement Data System).
Prompted in part by data requirements in the federal No Child Left Behind law, the state passed legislation in 2002 that was supposed to create the California Longitudinal Pupil Achievement Data System. Unlike the current system, which only transfers reports and records, the new system will be able to store and evaluate student data gathered over the years.
What teachers and principals need—according to those interviewed for this video—are data that come from tests given throughout the current school year, are given to them in a timely fashion and in an environment that values collaboration and problem solving, and allow them to adjust instructional strategies. It is only in this way, they argue, that significant gains in student achievement will be realized.
A system that allows for tracking a student's academic performance over time.
California Partnership for Achieving Student Success is a resource to help educators improve student achievement by identifying and reducing barriers to successful student transition in all levels of education from kindergarten through college.
The purpose of this report is to examine issues of Colorado and provide recommendations for improving the quality of instruction for all students across teacher quality in the state, including addressing the issue that the data about teachers in Colorado are incomplete, inhibiting the ability to improve teacher quality and student achievement.
The approach, which relies on collaboration and data from quiz scores to attendance records, is rocking the bureaucratic, tradition-bound world of public education. It also is bringing hope to jargon-weary educators grasping at ways to improve test scores and shed dire-sounding designations - and the sanctions that go with them - under the No Child Left Behind Act.
Presentation on how Christina School District in Wilmington, Delaware uses data to improve student achievement and school/community partnerships
Presentation prepared by the Division of Accountability, Research, and Measurement Florida Department of Education, March 2007
Presentation delivered to the Florida State Board of Education in December 2006
Press release from the Florida Department of Education on being the first state with 10 Essential Elements of a Longitudinal Data System
The Data Quality Campaign conducted a site visit in Florida in spring 2006 to gather information about its experience in developing a student-level longitudinal data system. This report summarizes the history of development, implementation issues, and lessons learned. Similar visits were conducted in Utah, Virginia, and Wisconsin.
Presentation prepared by the Division of Accountability, Research, and Measurement Florida Department of Education, February 2007
Presentation prepared by Florida's Postsecondary Education Access Task Force
The Florida K–20 Education Data Warehouse provides stakeholders in public education with the capability to receive timely, efficient, consistent responses to inquiries into Florida’s kindergarten through university education.
The College Board and the Florida Department of Education, following the educational goals outlined by Governor Jeb Bush, have forged a partnership to help children from middle school through senior high school improve their academic performance and prepare for a college education or a rewarding career.
Evaluation and Reporting Office of the Florida Department of Education
Current Policies & Practices in Georgia related to Capacity Building, Decision-Making Tools/Resources, and Data Systems & Sources, all of which are based on data.
Current Policies & Practices in Georgia related to Human Resources, Fiscal Resources, and Capacity-Building and Decision-Making Tools, all of which are based on data.
Powerpoint overview of the GLISI, including their commitment to using data to achieve their mission to equip, support and inspire educational leaders on the climb to higher levels of student achievement.
The Idaho Student Information Management System (ISIMS) project began formally in November 2001 and was terminated three years later, in December 2004. The object of this report has been to identify lessons that may be constructively applied to future state efforts, not to assign blame for past failures or credit for successes.
This presentation highlights a partnership between the Chicago Public Schools (CPS) and the Consortium on Chicago School Research at the University of Chicago to link secondary and postsecondary data. The groups collected information about college-going attitudes and aptitude in Chicago schools, which has helped CPS identify areas for improvement.
The High School Feedback Report for the Class of 2004 is produced collaboratively with data collected by the Council, the Kentucky Department of Education, the Kentucky Higher Education Assistance Authority, ACT, Inc. and The College Board. The report examines the college preparation and participation of Kentucky’s 2004 high school graduates. Each high school report features comparison info at the school, district and state levels and important school statistics such as ACT and Advanced Placement test-taking and success.
The Council on Postsecondary Education, a 16-member board appointed by the Governor, is the state coordinating board for postsecondary and adult education in Kentucky. The Council coordinates change and improvement in postsecondary and adult education as directed by the Kentucky Postsecondary Education Improvement Act of 1997.
Model that will have the capacity to examine the growth of achievement of children and link growth in student learning to teacher preparation programs.
This bill requires the Maryland State Department of Education (MSDE) and local boards of education to collect and maintain data to calculate a graduation rate for each graduating class. The bill proposes a graduation rate methodology that has been recommended by the National Governor's Association (NGA).
PowerPoint from the perspective of New Mexico's Department of Finance and Administration on the importance of making data actionable, the challenges of making data actionable, the key decisions that leaders need to make to improve student achievement, and the data needed to support and make those decisions. The presentation also includes actual examples from New Mexico.
New Mexico Public Education Department has decided to create process for collecting and managing data, a technology infrastructure to do the business of the agency, improving access to data, and train all stakeholders to become data knowledge workers for the following key purposes:
- Enhance data driven decision making at the classroom, school, district, and state-levels.
- Evaluate the effectiveness of schools, teachers and programs.
- Create reports for the public and for compliance with federal and state mandates.
- Improve agency effectiveness and accountability.
This fall, the state will give every district a new tool called Pennsylvania's Value-Added Assessment System or PVAAS. The state will pay for the analysis at a cost of about $2 a student for more than 900,000 students.
The Texas PK–16 Public Education Information Resource is a project designed to provide stakeholders in public education with ready access to public elementary, secondary and higher education information
The Data Quality Campaign conducted a site visit in Utah in spring 2006 to gather information about its experience in developing a student-level longitudinal data system. This report summarizes the history of development, implementation issues, and lessons learned. Similar visits were conducted in Florida, Virginia, and Wisconsin.
A report prepared for the Virginia Department of Education by the Center for Innovative Technology on the results of a Best Practices study performed in the area of development of multi-enterprise data exchange systems.
A status report submitted to the Virginia Board of Education on November 29, 2006.
A status report on the progress of the Council in its first year and its preliminary recommendations presented on October 2006.
The Data Quality Campaign conducted a site visit in Virginia in spring 2006 to gather information about its experience in developing a student-level longitudinal data system. This report summarizes the history of development, implementation issues, and lessons learned. Similar visits were conducted in Florida, Utah, and Wisconsin.
Virginia’s P–16 Education Council was created by executive order of Gov. Mark Warner in October 2005 to further integrate reforms across the entire spectrum of education from preschool to graduate school.
Request to Washington Legislature to fully fund a statewide database of longitudinal student data.
The Data Quality Campaign conducted a site visit in Wisconsin in spring 2006 to gather information about its experience in developing a student-level longitudinal data system. This report summarizes the history of development, implementation issues, and lessons learned. Similar visits were conducted in Florida, Utah, and Virginia.
