When Will Classrooms Join the “Big Data” Trend?

“Big Data” has been launched into every area of our lives: businesses, consumer products, political campaigns, healthcare, and more. But data still hasn’t managed to penetrate the classroom in many schools.

Last week, New America’s Education Policy Program released a new paper, Promoting Data in the Classroom: Innovative State Models and Missed Opportunities, that explores K-12 teachers’ use of data to improve instruction. It focuses on two such efforts in Oregon and Delaware, both federally funded projects, and highlights key takeaways from both for state officials and policymakers.

Recently, we published an op-ed in Roll Call exploring the federal policy implications of the report:

Congress can do more. Already, lawmakers fund two federal programs that include an explicit focus on the collection and use of data – the Statewide Longitudinal Data Systems and Race to the Top competitive grant programs. Those funds enabled Oregon and Delaware to deliver 21^st century data skills to teachers across their states. Another program – the Improving Teacher Quality State Grants program, or Title II, Part A of the No Child Left Behind Act – carries even more potential. It’s a formula program, provided to every state, every year for the explicit purpose of improving teacher quality. And it could be the key to equipping teachers with the skills they need to learn from the reams of student data already available to the classroom.

The Senate began marking up the long-overdue reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (currently known as No Child Left Behind), and the House is expected to embark on that process soon. We hope neither chamber will forget 21^st century skills in data-driven instruction as they do:

Already, policymakers face a long to-do list when they start the reauthorization of No Child Left Behind. But when they do, members of Congress should be sure not to lose sight of the ultimate end goal of federal education policy: bringing better teachers to schools, so they can better serve students. And that means bringing schools and teachers into the golden age of data.

To read the full op-ed, click here. For the full report, Promoting Data in the Classroom: Innovative State Models and Missed Opportunities, click here.