Attributes of districts that make wise use of data

Strong leadership: All administrators are committed to collecting and using data for decision making and improving teaching and learning.
A supportive district-wide culture for using data for continuous improvement: Data is not used as a “stick.” It is made available to all students, teachers, administrators, and parents to review and use to make improvements.
Strong service orientation toward principals and teachers: Specialists are made available to help with data analysis, and district leaders often sit down with principals to review school goals and results.
Partnership with universities, businesses, and non-profits: Assistance is sought from outside sources for expertise and for additional analyses.
A formal and institutionalized mechanism for supporting and training personnel to use data: Persons within the district and school are designated to work with school data and work with school staff.
Close accounting on every student’s performance on academic standards: Test results and classroom assessments are constantly reviewed and used to help students meet performance targets.
A focused flexibility on how time is used: School day restructuring and flexible grouping patterns for student instruction allow grade-level teacher teams to plan together.
A well-defined, data-driven school improvement process: Schools use data to identify problems, create action plans to address problems, and monitor the implementation and results to see how well the plan works. The results are fed back into the next cycle for improvement planning.

Jane Armstrong and Kathy Anthes, American School Board Journal, November 2001