Those of you tracking the evolution of data-driven decision making across schools and districts might be interested in a new free resource from Education Week. The editors have collected trends and commentaries from the publication on some of the most pressing issues in the field, including the rise of real-time data for school research and how districts are balancing student privacy with data use.
Also, William J. Slotnik, the founder and executive director of the Community Training and Assistance Center, in Boston, and Martin Orland, the director of evaluation and policy research at WestEd, in San Francisco, make a passionate plea that as districts increase their data use, they must dedicate as much focus to building educators’ capacity to change their instructional practice in response. “How do you get a healthier chicken? Do you weigh it more often, or do you improve the quality of the feed?” they argue.
Those interested can download the package here.