WASHINGTON—March 19, 2014—The Data Quality Campaign (DQC) awarded state and local leaders today who have demonstrated a focus on using education data (which include student attendance, demographics, and college-readiness scores) at all levels to support families and educators in their efforts to improve student achievement.
“We are thrilled to be able to honor the work of these great leaders from around our nation. They understand data are most useful when shared in the right format at the right time with parents, educators, policymakers, and other stakeholders to ensure our young people graduate from high school prepared for college and career,” said Aimee Rogstad Guidera, executive director of the Data Quality Campaign.
State Policymaker, Delaware Governor Jack Markell
Delaware Governor Jack Markell received DQC’s 2014 State Policymaker Award for establishing the statewide vision and collaborative work needed to use data to improve outcomes for Delaware students.
Governor Markell laid the foundation for Delaware to build the state’s data systems, from early learning to higher education and careers, and to nurture a culture of data-driven decision making. The impact of this work is exemplified by the implementation of professional learning communities (PLCs). PLCs provide educators statewide opportunities to work with data coaches and collaborate with their colleagues to improve instruction. They are considered strong practice in professional development and data use.
Delaware recently became one of the first states to achieve all of DQC’s 10 State Actions to Ensure Effective Data Use—having marshaled the leadership, policies, and resources to overcome the barriers of turf, trust, technical issues, and time that many states still face. Much of this is due to Governor Markell’s leadership.
District Data Leader: Evansville Vanderburgh School Corporation, Indiana
Under the guidance of Superintendent David Smith and Deputy Superintendent Susan McDowell Riley, the Evansville Vanderburgh School Corporation (EVSC) has promoted effective data use, security, and transparency by creating data dashboards for secure teacher access to student data and using district assessments to gain rich information about student performance.
EVSC adopted the Harvard-based DATA WISE approach for supporting student learning and improving schools through teacher data literacy—the skills needed to effectively use data to improve instruction. District leaders have collaborated with two local universities on a curriculum to train future teachers in how to interpret student data and apply it to their classroom efforts.
Student achievement has improved as a result of the district’s efforts: 51 percent of its schools are at the highest grade level or showed improvement on Indiana’s accountability measures, and 38 percent of its schools improved by one or more grades on the most recent measure.
Contact: Dakarai Aarons, daarons@dataqualitycampaign.org, 202-997-6519
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