Overview and key findings: Data dashboards

Written by Mica Pollock, Jedd Cohen, and Josh Wairi for the dashboard project, with dashboard development by local technologist Seth Woodworth

Click here for the Summary on this project; click here for the Expanded story on this project.

Communication we hoped to improve

What aspect of existing communication did we try to improve, so that more people in Somerville could collaborate in young people's success? How’d it go?

(Who was involved in the project and how was time together spent? What did the project accomplish?)

In an era when you can log on to any computer and get quick updates from friends, there’s no reason why all the people who need to know basic info in order to serve young people can’t know it immediately. Quantitative measures or summary data about young people (e.g., a report card) never show "the whole child" (eportfolios can help with that!), but they still provide information crucial to the process of tracking student progress, and they do tend to predict important events like “dropping out.”

Unfortunately, access to the data systems needed to provide this info varies widely among districts. Those that can afford it are increasingly investing in sophisticated data systems. Lower income districts can’t afford to. And when districts do have online data display tools, called “data dashboards,” they typically aren't designed by educators or parents.

We - local technologists, teachers, and researchers - have been working with families, afterschool providers, principals, and central administration in the Somerville School District to meet the need for a user-friendly, affordable way to view lots of student data in one place. The result of our work is a suite of three “data dashboards” - open source web applications designed to link the family, teachers, principal, and afterschool providers in communication about student data to support each student’s success.

Considering who usefully sees what data on children has been core to the dashboard project. Guided by a collaborative design process that drew on representatives of all the community stakeholders above, Somerville technologists Seth Woodworth and Evan Burchard created three views: an “admin view” for principals, which shows data on all students in the school; a “teacher view,” which shows a teacher data on the students in his or her class; and an “individual view,” designed to link teachers, afterschool providers, and families in communication about the details of an individual student’s profile. Our plan has been to pilot each of these views at Somerville’s Healey School this fall: 5th grade teacher (and author) Josh Wairi and his parents have wanted to pilot the individual and teacher views, and Principal Purnima Vadhera has wanted to pilot the admin view.

We felt that it was crucial to collaborate with the Somerville community to design open-source educational tools that link the partners in young people’s education in regular communication about their learning. Here are the main reasons:

A gap in student data equals a gap in service.

Principals Vadhera and DeFalco, teacher Josh Wairi, and various students we talked to in our other pilots all mentioned instances where a student “fell through the cracks” because of a piece of missing data -- for example, a student who received an unexpectedly poor grade at the end of the semester, with the parent, the homeroom teacher, or the administrator surprised by the news. These main partners also described how seeing new patterns, and faster, could support timely interventions -- from MCAS accommodations to targeted academic support.

One-Stop Shopping: It seems crucial to be able to see different kinds of student data at the same time, in a single display.

To clarify: Somerville, like a typical district, has a “student information system” - a database that stores or “warehouses” student information. However, many districts do not have any easy tools for quickly displaying that information to multiple partners at once, for putting that data all in one place for viewing, or letting them sort the data for patterns. In Somerville, the data on these "dashboards" all exist in Somerville's student info system: the issue is that such data have been hard to view quickly all in one place. Lots of people in Somerville talked about the need to improve data display for parents and students, teachers, afterschool providers, and administrators.

In Somerville, administrators had to send data analysis requests to a central office (filled with great staff!) and the staff would send patterns back to them. Or, teachers had to create their own Excel spreadsheets or printouts and analyze them by hand. Administrators also told us of time wasted in meetings as staff flipped through multiple folders or drawers to find data; further, staff wasted lots of time preparing for meetings by trying hand-analyze patterns across such data sources.

The data was inaccessible for other reasons, too: when they could access the student information system with a password, parents and some teachers had a hard time understanding the way the system displayed data, and the data is only in English. Notably, many viewers (e.g, parents) cannot comment ON the data in the student information system; they can only view it.

Open source data tools could save schools across the country significant costs, IF design goes fast enough, IF community users are ready to use the tools, and IF tech support for open source tools remains available locally.

We decided to develop an open source solution for one simple reason: we figured an open source tool (made with "free to modify" software modifiable by any skilled programmer) could save Somerville and other districts lots of money. Others had offered to make Somerville dashboards for hundreds of thousands of dollars, and then require tens of thousands of dollars for annual upkeep. We figured that with our grant, we could work with a local technologist to develop an open source tool to educators' and parents' specifications; any next district could then have the tool for its own use. If open source development produces a free tool, districts don’t have to buy the product itself or renew the license to use it; they only have to pay for services (upkeep and troubleshooting the tool), which can be a fraction of the cost. Our local technologist Seth put it this way: “Take the quarterly profit of a company like Blackboard INC (Quarter 1, 2010) and break it down into services and license fees. In just one quarter, Blackboard made only $7.3 million in services [tech support], but made $93.7 million dollars in 'product revenues' (licenses to run their software). In the K-12 context, a freely available and documented open source competitor to store-bought communication tools would free up a lot of money back to US schools.”

Districts also pay lots of money for store-bought, "off the shelf" dashboard tools and then find them unused by the community. We wanted to try to build something to community specifications instead. Based on a model created in Excel by Healey dad Greg Nadeau, and designed in partnership with Principals Jason DeFalco and Purnima Vahdera, and teacher Josh Wairi during the 2010-2011 school year, the admin and teacher view dashboards we made provide quick views for teams of teachers and administrators to compare students in a group and discern patterns. All data fields are visible on one screen, so there is no need to click through multiple windows to view the desired data (as users do to see data in the district's student information system). Viewers can sort up to three columns at a time simply by clicking at the top of each while holding down the shift key. Whereas the admin view lists all students in the school, the teacher view presents similar information for a single class of students. Here is the admin view, with fictional data to maintain confidentiality:

NewAdminDash.jpg

Our individual view (below) is designed to be used by educators, parents, and afterschool providers; it complements the "admin" and "teacher views" with additional student data that was identified by Healey parents, students, afterschool providers, and teachers as being especially relevant to their communications with each other.

Importantly to the OneVille Project, this "individual view" also gives parent and afterschool provider viewers the chance to comment ON the data and send these comments to the teacher's email inbox, sparking an exchange that can continue over email or in person. Here is the individual view’s final page, where viewers can review and submit their comments:

Note the tabs for viewing other pages at the top of the screenshot. The images below show the pages connected to each of these tabs, covering grades, test scores, attendance, and teacher summary comments.

In creating the individual view, we drew on a data display model from the New Visions schools in New York (http://www.hfrp.org/var/hfrp/storage/fckeditor/File/9thGradeTracker.pdf) combined it with Somerville’s locally designed K-6 report card, and worked with teacher Josh Wairi and his families (with advice from his students and afterschool providers) to integrate everyone’s insights into the testable product.

Our goal in fall 2011-12 has been to pilot and tweak these three tools with educators, administrators, families, students, and afterschool providers. We have wanted to explore the ways these tools can support information-sharing and teamwork among all these people – in meetings, one-to-one interactions, and email-based conversations about the data.

In all this, we've encountered the core problem with designing and creating tools from scratch, to community specifications and on a budget: while our local technologist worked to produce tools to community specifications, he went slowly enough in responding to community feedback that when we wanted to start the pilot Sept 1, the views weren't ready.

So, our dashboards took a long time to design as we collected input on design for months; local technologist, working for small amounts of money, created the tools but ran out of time and money to do more than a very small pilot.

Even if the tools don't seed in Somerville in the end, we are certain that the open source code will support next efforts at free educational data displays for districts or programs too often spending fortunes on storebought tools; we have added a tool to the “kit” by producing an open source dashboard and code next developers can modify. Still, we note that the OneVille projects in which we used preexisting tools – Google sites or wikispaces for eportfolio software, and texting software like Google Voice – seeded the most longstanding local change most quickly.

We note that professionals able to produce tools quickly, or local technologists on larger budgets, might provide more immediately ready open source infrastructure for schools and districts. For example, after the same local young technologist struggled to complete our Parent Connector Network hotline, the hotline was finally made by Leo Burd, a new colleague at MIT who specialized in such open source tools and was inspired enough by the Parent Connector project that he did it for free.

Our work, and our ¡Ahas!

What was the basic groundwork needed to support the current work? How did the project change and grow over time? At this point, what are our main ¡Ahas! about improving communications in public education? What communication and implementation ¡Ahas! and turning points did we have over time?

Our main ¡Ahas! over time have been these:

¡Aha! A gap in student data equals a gap in service.

¡Aha! One-Stop Shopping: People say it's crucial to be able to see different kinds of student data at the same time, in a single display.

¡Aha! Open source data tools could save schools across the country significant costs, IF design goes fast enough, IF community users are ready to use the tools, and IF tech support for open source tools remains available locally.

¡Aha! The families whose children most need assistance are often the hardest to reach with technology, but they are also the most in need of such rapid access to information.

Communication and implementation ¡Ahas!, and turning points!

We had many ¡Aha! in sequence on this project over two years. To read the full story of the efforts that gave us these ¡Ahas!, click here!

In addition to our Main ¡Ahas! about data dashboards, we had other key discoveries along the way:

¡Aha! In addition to having the ability to quickly see and sort such basic data, diverse partners in young people’s lives need supports to communicate ABOUT basic data.

¡Aha! Many parents welcome an invitation into a conversation with their child’s teachers, and even if these parents are unfamiliar with technology, these parents often see technology as an opportunity for connection, rather than an obstacle.

Our products: Concrete communication improvements and next steps

We’ve gotten feedback from parents, teachers, and administrators about the dashboards’ potential value. In recent interviews, for example, several immigrant parents emphasized the way the individual view dashboard could spark parent involvement: Smiling, one said, "Parents are not just left out of the school. With this, you are bringing them in, sucking them into the school curriculum!"

In a recent planning meeting with OneVille staff, Principal Vadhera described the value of the integrated dashboard tools, in contrast to the old system of requesting info from many different people: “Right now, in just five minutes, I have seen a complete picture of the kid. Without even checking in with folks [other staff]. Normally, I would have to wait for them to get back to me, and bring charts and graphs to meetings. What a great way to launch conversation.”

Purnima and Josh both suggested that the dashboards could enhance teamwork among educators at Healey: In staff team meetings, access to each view could allow teachers and administrators to collaboratively assess a student’s needs, design targeted interventions, and, if desired, record their plan by submitting it as subject-specific comments that get archived in the homeroom (lead) teacher’s email.

The families whose children most need assistance are often the hardest to reach with technology, but they are also the most in need of such rapid access to information. We’d need to continue this kind of outreach during a pilot phase, because we face the same challenges with the individual view as anyone working to enhance collaboration around students across barriers of income, racial/ethnic background, language difference and tech literacy. Not all parents have home access to computers and internet (though phones with internet access are increasingly popular), and some parents are not functionally literate in their home language.

As described above, we planned to pilot our three “views” in fall 2011 and report out what we learned. One classroom’s teacher, families, students, and supporting teachers were ready to test the dashboard in fall 2011, as were their principal and local afterschool providers. However, the young local technologist who created these products to community specifications went so slowly on our limited budget that we weren’t able to pilot them beyond a rapid test of use. A district administrator wanted to pull the plug on the pilot, having lost confidence in open source development, but he recognized too that a tool for easily seeing data "all in one place" otherwise will not exist in Somerville due to the expense of "off the shelf" tools. So the crack in the infrastructure remains.

The lesson here involves the timeline of software development, and the risks associated with community-based design research. The working relationship with the community partner (e.g., the school district) becomes asymmetrical when developing a software application from scratch - lots of work on the developer's end without immediate results for the community partner, potentially leaving them with “cold feet” by the time the product is ready unless major funding remains to keep modifying the product over time. We're optimistic that if not in Somerville, another community and next developer can pick up right where we left off, rather than starting from scratch like we did. That's how open source development works, in fact. The code for these dashboard products is now available online and free to the next developer (see below, Technological How-Tos).

While some at the Healey are disappointed not to try the dashboard in a broad way, one piece of this project that has unflagging community support is our plan to work this year with the Healey PTA to create a model of basic computer and email training run by parents for other parents who need this support. Our goal was to link this training to the dashboard training for parents; instead our hook will be the school's newly schoolwide listserv. We’ve already established a computer in the PTA room, available for parent use at prescheduled times, and we’re reaching out to other computing facilities in the school and community organizations. We’ll be reaching out in particular to parents in Mr. Wairi’s new class about how to support them to access the Internet.

Questions to Ask Yourself if You’re Tackling Similar Things Where You Live

What big issues would we recommend others think about in their own attempts to improve communications in public schools? Contact us to talk more!

Here are some questions to ask yourself if you want to tackle similar things in your school:

➢Can everyone who needs to get and share important progress information, get and share it when they need to?

➢If not, what barriers are in the way and how can those be overcome?

➢To support young people, what “data” should show up on any data display, and why?

➢What data isn’t found in any “student information system” but should still be known?

➢What infrastructure would support actual conversations ABOUT "data," between the people who share young people? Which conversations should happen in person and which could be supported online? Could you do an experiment to test which works for what?

➢Is your district spending tons of money on data display tools to get basic data in front of people?

➢ If so, how could low cost tech development support such information-sharing, and design something local people would actually use?

➢ ***How can you ensure resources for ongoing tech modifications and tech support after you have developed your initial tool?

Technological how-tos

Here's where we describe "how to" use every tool we used, so that others could do the same. We also describe "how to" make every tool we made!

Admin/Teacher View Source Code (written in the Django framework)

Individual View Source Code (written in the Ruby on Rails framework)

Click here for the Summary on this project; click here for the Expanded story on this project.