The Data Quality Campaign has been reviewing state report cards from all 50 states and the District of Columbia for the past seven years. We continue to examine the landscape of state report cards because we believe states must increase transparency and build trust by sharing information. But after many years, we knew it was time to look at state report cards with fresh eyes.
This year, you don’t have to take our word for it.
In addition to our regular review of state report cards, we asked parents—the audience that these report cards are meant to serve—whether their state report card meets their needs. Watch below to hear directly from five parents about their reflections, frustrations, and hopes for the future.
DQC’s review of 2022 state report cards found:
did not include up-to-date assessment scores for the 2021–22 school year.
did not share achievement data broken down by all federally required groups of students, including 13 states that did not share data broken down by gender (a federal requirement since 2001).
did not include growth data from the 2021–22 school year, and 4 states did not include growth data at all.
did not include up-to-date high school graduation information for the 2021–22 school year, and 20 states did not include this information (updated or not) broken down by all federally required groups of students.
Report cards are the first and oldest federal mandate to share information publicly, and seven years in, there is still work to be done.
These resources serve as the transparency baseline for parent and public understanding of how schools are serving students. But progress on state report cards has stalled or, in some cases, moved backward.
State and federal leaders should turn their attention back to these important resources and ask themselves again whether they are producing resources that meet the needs of their most important audiences—and as a result, providing the public with information on school quality and student success.
We are not giving up—and neither should state and federal leaders who have a responsibility to communities to share data.
Take Action
- Use our parent scavenger hunt, the same one that the parents in the video used, and examine your state’s report card to learn what information you can and can’t find.
- Share this report. Start a conversation in your community about our findings and why it is important for families and communities to have the information they need to make decisions.
- Read our vision to transform state data systems to inform people’s pathways through education and the workforce to understand the concrete impact that access to information will have on people’s lives.
To view the entire set of data we used in our analysis, see our data file.
To view our reports from previous years, see our topic guide.
