Data modernization and security practices allow educational leaders to provide accurate, secure, and timely data that can be securely exchanged, shared, and connected in order to provide instant understanding of school performance, student attendance, academic performance, or funding from multiple sources. This matters because: (1) Data modernization saves time and provides insights for a teacher who can access student-level data to be used for lesson planning or assessment; (2) Data modernization empowers a superintendent who can visualize trustworthy building-level data to support long-term and short-term decision making for a district; and (3) Comprehensive data that is efficiently and effectively captured can be used by state leaders to support, advocate, and ensure historically underserved student populations--Black, Indigenous, and students of color, emergent bilingual, students with disabilities, and students experiencing poverty--have equitable educational access and opportunities. This brief shares promising practices from North Dakota and Wisconsin.