Hawaii has strengthened its student data system but needs to do more to ensure the information is being used to improve teaching, inform decisions and track student progress — even after graduation, a new report says.
The Data Quality Campaign, as part of a state-by-state analysis issued Thursday, recognized Hawaii’s efforts in building state data banks, creating progress reports with student data and using data to guide state efforts.
Of 10 key "actions" recommended for states, Hawaii met five.
The benchmarks Hawaii failed to meet included those surrounding training for teachers in the use of data, work to link multiple data systems to track students after they leave school and strategies to raise awareness about the availability of data among parents, teachers and lawmakers.
No state met all the actions, while 19 met six or more.
"We’re moving in the right direction," said Tammi Chun, the governor’s policy adviser on education. Chun added that several new initiatives using student data will be rolled out soon, including an effort to track students as they move into the work force or as they make their way through college.
The state is also looking to make data more accessible to the public.
Nationally, the picture is similar to what’s being seen in Hawaii.
The Data Quality Campaign, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit whose mission is to encourage the use of high-quality education data to improve student achievement, said states are making progress but are still falling short, especially in the area of making data available to decision makers.
"State policymakers are right now in the process of allocating scarce resources based on what works to help students, and they cannot do that well without data," Aimee Guidera, campaign executive director, said in a news release. "We will see improved student achievement only when all stakeholders — from parents to policymakers — actually use … data."
The U.S. Department of Education and education advocates are increasingly pushing the use of student data to help guide education reform efforts and track the outcomes of students once they leave school.
Chun said that while Hawaii has more to do, it has come a long way in improving its student data collection. This year the state Department of Education started a program to give teachers tools that could give them instant results on whether their students understand a lesson.
