Data That Matters: Giving High Schools Useful Feedback on Grads' Outcomes
Posted by
Kevin Park on Tue, Nov 22, 2011 @ 12:34 PM
Now more than ever, there is an agreement that students should graduate high school college and career ready. What does that mean exactly and how can learning institutions tell if they are meeting the goal?
It's not easy, says Policy Analyst Anne Hyslop, in Data That Matters: Giving High Schools Useful Feedback on Grads' Outcomes. In it, Hyslop lays out the benefits of a unified data system that could provide high schools with timely information about their graduates.
According to a 2010 Deloitte educational survey, only 13 percent of high school educators receive reports of their graduates' academic performance in college. Most frequently, principals receive college readiness information through occasional anecdotes from former students and their families. Worse, 8 percent of educators reported they receive no information at all.
However, thanks to significant investments in K–12 and higher education data systems, significant progress has been made in developing a system that will give educators the information they need. Currently, over 40 states can collect information about college readiness. Yet only eight of these states are using that information in ways that can materially improve college preparation.
In Data That Matters, Hyslop identifies the important characteristics of the most successful college readiness reports.