Data Science
Big Data: Like Sunshine For Parents
Does school performance data really matter to parents? And does it facilitate parent-driven school accountability? As GreatSchools CEO Bill Jackson put it during his testimony before Congress in late 2011, “School performance data is like sunshine for parents. Parents need data to make good decisions about their children’s education.”
SMARTtech Roundup: From Blended Learning to Big Data
Blended Schools & Tools Blended Schools Sprouting. Vail Blended Learning is a new blended middle school in Arizona that uses laptops as its main learning tool using online content developed by K12 Inc., e2020, and VBL Curriculum and Instruction. Students have a flexible daily schedule and move through…
Q&A: Tim Knowles on Making Education an Evidence-Based Profession
It was a shocker when Tony Bryk announced that he was leaving University of Chicago for Stanford almost a decade ago. Bryk ran the best research shop the country--one known for making local observations with such clarity that they were always of national importance. UC turned to Tim Knowles, another guy that raises the average IQ in the room when he attends a meeting.
Infographic: The Potential of Edu Data
The Michael & Susan Dell Foundation recently released an infographic on the Ed-Fi Tool Suite, a universal educational data standard and tool suite, showcasing its significant gains in momentum and use in eight K-12 state education agencies, districts and vendors and the potential of educational data.
Big Data Partnership: Promise & Problems
The Department of Education announced a data partnership with SRI called Evidence Framework for Innovation and Excellence in Education. The first paper is Enhancing Teaching and Learning Through Educational Data Mining and Learning Analytics: An Issue Brief. The data partnership should advocate more nimble forms of evidence gathering, recognize the important role of state policy, and take on the issue of comparability.
US Grad Rate Inches Up–But Marshall Plan Needed
High school graduation rates are inching up to more than 75%, that's the conclusion of a report released monday. It's also good news that from 2008 to 2009 (the most current data available), the number of dropout factory high schools decreased by an additional 112 schools to 1,634. Compared to 2002 almost there has been a decline of nearly 800,000 in 'dropout factory' enrollment.
10 Ways Big Data Will Improve Learning
The shift to personal digital learning will soon swamp our schools with more data than teachers ever dreamed possible. More and better data will inform educational decisions, lead to better public policy, and will boost achievement. It's time for schools, districts, and states to begin planning for Big Data.
10 Lessons for Edupreneurs
The ImagineK12 team--Alan Louie, Tim Brady, and Geoff Ralston--are making good company choices, giving good advice, and having fun. Rob Hutter and I spoke with the second cohort yesterday and shared 10 lessons for edupreneurs.
10 D.C. Public Charters Turn to SchoolForce in the Cloud
E.L. Haynes Public Charter Schools announced today that it received a $2.3 million Instructional Improvement Systems (IIS) grant through the DC Office of the State Superintendent of Education's Race to the Top (RTTT) program to lead a consortium of 10 D.C. Public Charter Schools in developing and deploying a pilot of SchoolForce™.
New Classrooms Innovation Partners Announces Plans to Personalize the Classroom
New Classrooms Innovation Partners (New Classrooms), a non-profit intended to help schools implement effective adaptive and personalized learning models, announced its launch today.