This is the fourth volume of a four-volume report of Project EDNEED II (Empirical Determination of Nationally Essential Educational Data), conducted from July 1975 to September 1976 to document the extent to which data currently collected by State vocational education agencies could be used to answer vocational education informational needs of…

Good information is essential to making intelligent policy decisions. The availability of information about education in Manitoba is hampered both by the questionable validity of much of the data and by the lack of centralized sources. Without attempting to be exhaustive, this booklet briefly analyzes the types of information available on…

Suggests how data from the Ginzberg-Yohalem Survey of Educated Women might be analyzed to address the Ginzberg-Yohalem Survey of (1) person-situation interaction; (2) attitudes and behavior; (3) attribution theory; (4) helping behavior; and (5) social motivation. (Author/GC)

The article demonstrates how information managers at institutions of higher education can develop a checklist for evaluating the usability and effectiveness of institutional data and information. Three primary personnel roles (technicians, analysts, users) and five primary activities (selection, capture and storage, manipulation and analysis,…

School systems can be data rich and information poor if they do not understand and manage their data effectively. The task for school leaders is to put existing data into a format that lends itself to answering questions and improving outcomes for the students. Common barriers to transforming data into knowledge in education settings often include…

University information systems are designed to make decisions easier and to provide good information for administrative tasks. Data do not by themselves produce better decisions, and more data can make agreement on issues more complicated. When collegial decisions are made, the precise impact of data and models is uncertain. When there is no…

This paper describes six existing evaluator-auditor working formats and the conditions which foster credibility of evaluation findings. Evaluators were classified as: (1) member of project developmental team, accountable to project director; (2) independent internal evaluator, accountable to system in general but not to project directors, and (3)…

During the 2002-2003 academic year, six roundtables were held to explore uses of the data from the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE) for improvement of student learning. This paper describes the roundtable discussion held in October 2002 at the Professional Organizational Development conference in Atlanta, Georgia. Thirteen faculty…

Is Ohio losing its best and brightest minds? That's what is often implied by some well-publicized data on college graduates who move to other states after graduation. But what do these data actually tell us? This Commentary shows that they do not paint a complete picture of the emerging class of graduates, much less the state's workforce. States…

Describes the Pittsburgh Public School System's Division of Computer Services established in 1968 to develop computer applications to provide reliable, timely, and accurate information for all phases of the school system. (Author)

Considers the implications of administrative accountability, the need for self-evaluation, and the desire to determine relationships between processes used and outcomes produced for recent approaches to collecting evaluation data. (Author/EA)

This guide presents an introduction to the basics about data collection and discusses the uses of data in daily work. The emphasis is on youth programs in Indiana, but the information is useful for programs in other states. Ways in which program planners and advocacy activists can use data are described, and local, state, and national resources…

The purpose of this case study was to provide the Portland Public Schools' Research and Evaluation Department with information to guide the development of improved data collection, reporting, and information delivery systems in order to target these systems to more effectively meet the decision-making needs of teachers, principals, parents and…

This paper discusses evaluation of human service programs. Evaluation can be useful because: (1) evaluative data can be relevant to the basic goal of a demonstration to field test some strategy or technique; (2) process evaluation can help generate enthusiasm for self-improvement among staff; (3) evaluation can help build a communication network…

The value systems by which the users of purchased information services select which one to use or buy are found to differ sharply among different user populations, but the variable found to control them is a function of use, not of the user as an individual. Selection variables are summarized in a matrix of user values and interaction effects. The…