SacBee Op-Ed: Student-Level Data Are Needed

We recently came across this opinion piece from the Sacramento Bee and, given its data focus, thought it might be of interest.

Written by former state legislator Dede Alpert and former state superintendent of public instruction Jack O’Connell, the article outlines the need for a tool to measure student progress over time. While California has such a system — the California Longitudinal Pupil Achievement Data System (CALPADS) — funding has been cut to support it.

In encouraging the state Legislature to restore funding for the system, Alpert and O’Connell note the following:

“Now more than ever, accurate student information is needed for sound decision-making, transparency, accountability and good stewardship of taxpayer dollars.

Without timely restoration of the federal funds by the Legislature and the new governor this month, California will be without a critical information tool to help us create the most effective education system possible for students or meet federal reporting requirements.”

Read the entire article, as well as comments supporting and opposing the system, here.

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Posted by kidsdata.org

This entry was posted on Friday, January 14th, 2011 at 10:34 am. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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