Data Dashboards: Accounting for What Matters
From the Publisher: “This paper looks at using a data dashboard system as an alternative method of measuring school and district performance. It discusses ways this approach can address some of the limitations of traditional methods, and considers issues involved in creating an effective dashboard system. It also recommends federal and state policy changes that would make this type of system feasible.”
This resource effectively states its purposes through its title and an introductory section. The authors generally meet those purposes, although most of the supporting evidence comes from testimony of educators who have implemented a school report card system rather than from research. The paper raises and covers reasonable issues related to the needs and processes for developing data dashboards, but it could have been improved by including stronger details. Communications quality is solid in visual design and writing, but it should have been enhanced by actual dashboard examples. Users interested in developing dashboards may find this publication helpful, especially for its appendices that illustrate what some states are moving toward, although these too lack specific dashboard illustrations.