Professional educators must take advantage of public awareness and demand for change if education is to avoid a decade "full of sound and fury" in the 1980s. A solid statistical base is needed from which to describe, select, test, and evaluate policy alternatives. Teachers and government are critical inputs into the educational system. Teachers play the central role in the education enterprise, and it follows that data about teachers rank among the most important sets of information needed for making decisions about reforms in policy and practice. Federal government is the single largest source of support available for research and development, and policy setters need a simplified and readily available summary of the areas of education receiving federal investments, along with comparative data on how those investments have changed over time. The five aspects of schooling process mentioned are: textbooks, allocation of instructional time, utilization of resources from business and industry, the use of computers, and out-of-school opportunities for learning. A set of indicators for collecting data on outputs should be: (1) linked to inputs and processes; (2) indicative of permanent and significant change in the learner; and (3) of sufficient social significance to merit direct application to decisions about policy and practice. (JAZ)