Data-informed curriculum reform: Which data, what purposes, and promoting and hindering factors

Schools face a lot of data on the functioning of their school which they can use to make improvements in teaching, learning and the organization. For data use to lead to improvement, it is important to further research the concept data-driven decision making. The results of this explorative study in the Netherlands show that teachers mainly use classroom level data for making instructional decisions at classroom level, and school leaders mainly use school level data for policy development decisions. This article ends with suggestions with regard to enhancing the effectiveness of data-driven decision making, for example by stressing the importance of developing teachers' competence in the use of data

Collaborative data teams for school improvement:Work and sustainability

Data-driven decision making is becoming more and more important in education. The use of data can lead to school improvement (e.g. increased student achievement). However, in several schools data are not being used. In this paper we describe the first results of a pilot into supporting schools in the use of data by a data team approach. Collaborative data teams are teams of teachers (4-6) and (assistant) school leaders (1-2), who collaboratively use data to solve a certain educational problem within the school using a structured approach. A data team defines a problem, develops hypotheses about what causes the problem, collects data to either accept or reject the hypotheses, analyses and interprets the collected data, comes up with conclusions and measures to solve the problem, and evaluates the effectiveness of the measures. The results of the pilot show that data teams can be effective in two different manners: (1) a data team uses data to solve a problem, thereby improving education and (2) data team members learn how to use data to improve their work (e.g. professional development). At the end of this paper we explore the sustainability of this intervention - do teachers continue to use data (in data teams) after the intervention has been completed

Exploring data use practices around Europe: identifying enablers and barriers

In this article we explore what data-based decision making use looks like in schools in five different countries (United Kingdom, Germany, Poland, Lithuania and the Netherlands). We explore for what purposes data are used in these countries and what the enablers and barriers to data use are. The case study results show that schools in all five countries use data for school development, accountability, and instructional improvement. Also, the schools in the five countries struggle with the same type of problems: e.g. lack of access to high quality data, lack of professional development in using data, and a lack of collaboration around the use of data. Finally, we discuss how some enablers can turn into barriers for effective data use

The utilisation of a self-evaluation instrument for primary education

The utilisation of a self-evaluation instrument for primary education Thesis University of Twente, Enschede – With refs. – With Dutch summary. ISBN 978-90-365-2466-