According to Aimee Rogstad Guidera, CEO of Data Quality Campaign, collecting student data is an important factor in increasing student achievement despite frequent controversy over privacy and security concerns.

The trajectory of student data throughout the past decade has proven to be extremely beneficial to improving different facets of education, Guidera said.

"We now have tools that alert educators when students are at risk of falling off track. We have programs that identify opportunities for students, like scholarships, they may not be aware of otherwise. And that's just the tip of the iceberg for good data use," she said in her post on HuffingtonPost.com.

For one, Guidera says, student data helps keep both parents and the community in the loop about how schools are serving its students. Data helps people within the community compare how schools in the area perform compared against each other.

And as data use progresses, more and more states are using data to track how students are doing after graduation.

"... an increasing number of states, including Illinois, Ohio, and the District of Columbia, are working to help people access this information and providing training for parents to understand and use the data," she said.

Data enables an "early warning system" that helps schools determine when students are falling off track in order to help them before its too late.

It helps inspire more research into what works and what doesn't; such is the case in Washington, where it used student data to develop programs like Passport for Foster Youth. The program uses data on students in foster care to identify scholarships for individuals.

"To make sure the positive developments in student achievement from data use continue, policymakers should keep the beam of good data use lighting the way forward toward better learning outcomes for every child," Guidera said.

Read the full article here and comment with your thoughts below.

Article by Nicole Gorman, Education World Contributor

09/02/2015