School Data Rooms – Should Your School Use One?
In the data rooms of staff only of schools, it is a tradition to display student assessment results in charts. Typically, they present http://www.dataroomdata.com/how-to-set-up-a-data-room-for-your-company/ levels of proficiency (below basic or basic, proficient, or advanced) in a domain like reading or math. The aim is to direct the attention of teachers on students who are the most behind in their academics and require intensive intervention.
But in the midst of all the discussions about privacy for students these days, an open display of student data could do more harm than good. Particularly when the display contains the names of students, it can cause feelings of shame and humiliation for students who struggle. It’s important to think about the way your school uses these displays, and to think about more secure alternatives.
One of the best alternatives to traditional school data walls is an online platform that can store information about learning safely. These platforms can pull information from LMS assignments as well as formative and summative assessments, demographic data, and even integrate with your SIS for reporting. Teachers can access these data sets anytime via a secure dashboard. They can make use of a broad array of filters that focus on various trends or student groups/cohorts. They can also track live progress towards goals and get into the details of individual students and individual learning trends.
Regular discussions about data are essential for an area of data to be effective. This helps teachers focus their attention and leave with actionable actions to move students forward. If a team notices that a large number of students are struggling with math, for instance they may decide to create an intervention specifically for that domain and monitor progress until the students are at proficiency.