education

Empowering Educators with a Real-Time Student Data Dashboard

Introduction:

In a previous article, I discussed the importance of creating balanced classes based on data analysis. I would like to share the changes we have made at our elementary school to improve our data collection and create a real-time student data dashboard for teachers. These changes have streamlined the process and provided teachers with accurate and up-to-date information about their students for the upcoming school year.

If you are just getting started:

Here are a few things to keep in mind as you start this process.

Data collection: The first step is to collect data on all students, including academic performance, behavior, and social-emotional needs. This data can be collected from teachers, counselors, and learning support staff.

Scheduling: The school’s schedule can also play a role in class balance. For example, if there are limited resources for certain subjects, such as world language, students may need to be grouped in certain ways to ensure that everyone has access to these classes.

Demographics: It is also important to consider the demographics of the student body when creating classes. For example, schools may want to ensure that there is a balance of gender in each class and that students from different cultural backgrounds are represented.

Special needs: Students with special needs may require specific accommodations in the classroom. This can impact class balance, as teachers may need to group students with similar needs together.

Friendships: Counselors may also want to consider students’ friendships when creating classes. This can help to ensure that students feel comfortable and supported in their new classrooms.

Data Privacy and Protection: Consider how you will make sure the right teachers have access to the right data. Creating logins and protections through an access control list is a good place to start.

Streamlining data collection:

To reduce the burden on classroom teachers, we have simplified the data input process. Now, teachers are only required to provide information in a few areas:

overall reading, writing, and math levels,
parent involvement,
and a strengths & goals comment.

Learning support teachers, counselors, and our student information system (SIS) have already collected other relevant data points.

Three main data sources:

We have established three primary data sources that serve as the foundation for our real-time student data dashboard:

Source A: Demographic data from the SIS includes information such as response to intervention (RTI) support levels, speech and language services, and behavior incidents.

Source B: We introduced a new student survey that gathers data on language levels and second language choices. This helps us gain insights into the linguistic diversity of our student population and allows our world language team to place students into language classes.

Source C: New class enrollments with home base teacher assignments for the current school year provide essential information for class organization and teacher-student assignments.

Blending data in Google Sheets:

To consolidate these three sources into a single, comprehensive dataset, we opted to connect them to a Google Sheet and blend the data within Sheets. By ensuring that each source shares a common primary key, which is the student ID number, we can seamlessly combine the information using the formula syntax:

`=IFERROR(ARRAYFORMULA(VLOOKUP(`

Any updates made to the independent sources will be reflected in the main combined datasource, ensuring real-time accuracy.

The right data for the right people:

Whether it be for privacy or just for filtering information and saving time, setting up permissions in your dashboard is a useful feature. Looker Studio allows the creator to use a feature called Filter by Email.

If your dataset has email addresses associated with a row of data, Filter by Email will create a permissions layer where users need to log in to access the dashboard. Once logged in, users will only be able to rows of data associated with their email address. But what if you need more than one person to access a single row of data? No problem. You can set up an ACL, or Access Control List.

I created an ACL for nearly 350 staff and 90 different sections across our elementary school. This ACL is essentially a spreadsheet tab with a series of email addresses in a single column and groups, or classes, in a single row. Check boxes are then used to “give access” of a group to a certain person or group of people. Here is a short video that walks you through the process of setting up Filter by Email with multiple email addresses.

Real-time dashboard updates:

To provide teachers with continuous access to updated student data, we export data packages from the three sources on an hourly basis. These data packages are sent to an SFTP server, converted to CSV files, and then uploaded to a Google Sheet. This process allows for regular updates to the dashboard, allowing teachers to have the most recent information at their fingertips.

Benefits and future plans:

By implementing this real-time student data dashboard, we have overcome the limitations of our SIS, which often requires complex queries and lacks an aesthetically appealing format. Our streamlined process and user-friendly interface empower teachers to access and analyze student data effortlessly.

Moving forward, our plan is to further automate the data integration process by building an API key. This will enable the creation and updating of SQL tables in our SFTP server, directly connecting to Looker Studio—a powerful data analytics platform. Once our queries are precisely tailored to our needs, we will seamlessly integrate this process, providing teachers with even more efficient access to actionable insights.

3 more tips for creating balanced classes:

Involve all stakeholders: It is important to involve all stakeholders in creating balanced classes, including teachers, counselors, parents, and students. This will help to make sure that everyone’s needs are considered.
Be flexible: It is important to be flexible and willing to adjust class groupings as needed. For example, if a student’s needs change, they may need to be moved to a different class.
Use technology: Leverage systems such as databases and spreadsheets that can be shared. Make sure decision-makers are able to access the same information in real time. This reduces misunderstandings and miscommunication.

3 more tips for creating balanced classes:

Involve all stakeholders: It is important to involve all stakeholders in creating balanced classes, including teachers, counselors, parents, and students. This will help to make sure that everyone’s needs are considered.
Be flexible: It is important to be flexible and willing to adjust class groupings as needed. For example, if a student’s needs change, they may need to be moved to a different class.
Use technology: Leverage systems such as databases and spreadsheets that can be shared. Make sure decision-makers are able to access the same information in real time. This reduces misunderstandings and miscommunication.

Conclusion:

Creating a real-time student data dashboard has revolutionized how our elementary school leverages data to inform instruction and decision-making.By simplifying data collection and establishing regular updates, we have empowered teachers with accurate, up-to-date information.

As we continue to refine and automate our processes, we are confident that our data-informed approach will help all students succeed.

Chris

Chris Smith is an academic data analyst in the international education field. Throughout his 25 years in education, he noticed schools and educators collecting data but struggling with being overwhelmed or not knowing what to do with the data. So, he began coaching, training, and consulting schools and educators to learn how to discover what data they actually need and how they can turn it into information that leads to insights and informed decision-making.

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