Collaborative data inquiry can help schools serve their students better and improve student outcomes--but only if equity is prioritized. Researchers from Harvard's Data Wise Project discuss the importance of using an equity lens when engaging in collaborative data inquiry and what this can mean in terms of disrupting system inequities.

Students need "critical data literacy" skills to help make sense of the multitude of information available to them, especially as it relates to high-stakes issues of social justice. The authors describe two curriculum modules they developed--one on income equality, one on immigration--that help students learn to analyze data in order to…

A crucial site of bias in classrooms is class discussions. A new free web-based tool developed by university researchers can help teachers actively monitor how their biases are affecting students in real-time.

With the growth of tech-driven instructional possibilities, school systems have an increasingly urgent responsibility for schools to continuously assess and improve student data-protection practices. Attai, a project director for the Consortium for School Networking, outlines a program designed to help education leaders master the fundamentals of…

School leaders are often drowning in data but are unsure which forms of data will help them create a portrait of student achievement that will motivate staff to look beyond simple trends and delve deeper into root causes. Teachers often wish for more guidance on the kinds of data analysis and teaching strategies that will help them move the needle…

Schools are awash in data, and teachers are being asked to gather data in a myriad of high-tech and low-tech ways. But gathering is not analyzing, and without analysis there is little reason to gather the data in the first place. Teachers need data-collection systems that lend themselves to rapid analysis and action. This article presents several…

Teacher-led inquiry cycles--in which small groups of teachers study and address a promise--hold promise as a method of professional development, but only if they receive enough support. In particular, they need access to outside expertise that can help them meaningfully change instructional practices--often a difficult step for teachers working on…

Technology makes it easier than ever for educators to generate meaningful, ongoing data to inform their teaching, track student progress, and personalize learning. When the author began to explore how she could use technology to quickly assess student skills, data became exciting and took on a new role in her teaching practice. Now she uses data…

This article shares what "Educational Leadership" authors have to say about doing data right, which is the theme of this issue. The following questions are addressed in this article: (1) Are you using data to guide improvement?; (2) Are you looking at the right kinds of data?; (3) Are you using data to motivate students?; and (4) Are you…

The Clayton Christiansen Institute maintains a database of more than 400 schools across the United States that have implemented some form of blended learning, which combines online learning with brick-and-mortar classrooms. Data the Institute has collected over the past six months suggests three trends as this model continues to evolve and mature.…

In addition to excelling in subjects such as science, math, arts, and social studies, students must also develop skills like resiliency, adaptability, and collaboration in order to truly succeed in the world. But how do schools effectively measure those skills when they so often rely on standardized assessments? This article provides a thorough…

If your professional learning seems stalled, maybe you could put yourself and your colleagues in the driver's seat of professional development. The authors describe a professional learning approach that gives teachers both a say in what they focus their learning on and a chance to practice and refine teaching strategies that they hope to…

This article describes a language arts teacher's two-tiered way of using assessment data, which uses both standardized assessment data and teacher-created "skills" inventories. Standardized test data may help see where a learner performed in a previous year on items that often do not line up too well with future content. Standardized…

"Data-drive instruction can distort the way reading is taught, harming the students who need high-quality instruction the most," Susan B. Neuman concludes from her research team's two years of observation in nine low-income New York City schools. She describes how some students are reminded that they are "failures" every day by…

Surveys show rates of sexual harassment and misogyny among students are high in U.S. secondary schools--yet most schools fail to deal with this problem. Many educators would like to intervene when they hear students use degrading or sexualized language about girls (or LGBTQ youth) or harass them, but don't know how to do so effectively. The…