Brian Townsend, director of information technology for the Vermont Agency of Education, presented an update to the committee detailing how the new data system is advancing, and when data will be available for evaluating the effectiveness of the state’s public education system.
The AOE was awarded a $4.95 million Statewide Longitudinal Data Systems (SLDS) grant from the U.S. Department of Education in 2012.
Priorities for the system now being built with consultants for the state include:
1. To design, develop, and implement statewide, longitudinal kindergarten through grade 12 (K-12) data systems;
2. To develop and link early childhood data to the State’s K-12 data system;
3. To develop and link postsecondary and/or workforce data to the State’s K-12 data system.
Townsend said the agency’s proposal will “establish a streamlined data reporting and analysis system to be utilized by all publicly funded K-12 schools.”
The grant’s implementation was to be accomplished by this June, but the agency will seek an extension, which will not have a penalty, to “allow more time to complete the statewide implementation,” the update to the House and Senate this week notes.
The agency has hired Agilis Technology as the Technical Lead/Project Management vendor and selected Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (HMH) and their edFusion product to be implemented as Vermont’s K-12 SLDS.
“The initial system implementation will start by streamlining six existing collections encompassing core data about students, educators, and course offerings,” the report from the agency states.
The system will use data from internal school sources and the state agency, as well as external sources, Townsend said, “including, but not limited to, the Agency’s online educator licensing system, post-secondary readiness exams (e.g. SAT/AP/ACT exams), school finance, and standardized assessments.”
Funds are also earmarked to later expand the system to include the state’s Race To The Top – Early Learning Challenge federal grant “to integrate five early childhood data sets including
public prekindergarten, kindergarten readiness, and data from Vermont’s Head Start and Early Head Start programs,” the report notes.
House Education Committee Chairman Rep. David Sharpe, D-Bristol, asked Townsend for a definition of what, exactly, a longitudinal system is.
He was told that it was a system that “allows you to track progress of students or individuals through different domains.”
The data, Townsend explained, will “allow you to provide feedback on outcomes to measure the effectiveness of programs and makes sure you are allocating (funds) to the right programs.”
“What it’s supposed to do is ease the reporting burden on schools and the AOE,” Townsend said.
Ultimately, for everyone involved – the schools themselves, the state, and the Legislature, the data and how it is used should allow “more timely information to make better decisions at the school level, at the agency level, and provide information to legislators so that you know what’s working, and what’s not,” explained Townsend of the goal of the complex data bank being built.
“It really is about getting information to stakeholders so that they can make better decisions,” Townsend said.
Townsend said the grant includes $600,000 for Vermont’s public schools to come up to speed and be ready to be live with the new system.
He said the goal is to roll out the first half dozen supervisory unions by the end of this school year, with a hoped-for implementation statewide by June 2016.
Rep Bernie Juskiewicz, vice chairman of the House Education Committee asked, “None of this would be used for teacher evaluation?” Townsend said that is not the plan at present.
“Right now it’s just a tool to help measure growth,” Townsend said, to see if programs are effective and to make adjustments to programs that appear to be underperforming for kids.
Rep. Ann Manwaring, D-Wilmington, pointed out the state does not have a terrific track record on implementing huge, complex systems, “and I’m not even talking the health care system,” pointing to other state departments’ projects in the past. “How are you going to avoid that?” she asked.
“We always learn from mistakes,” said Townsend. “We’ve learned from what other states have done, too, so we’re not re-inventing the wheel.”
