Education Reform

A new data system

This legislation recognizes that access to quality education data is vital to helping implement a new vision for basic education that promotes continuous and individualized learning for all students.

Accountability for too long has been based on a single data element — a test score — and the system is viewed negatively as a way to "punish" schools, teachers and students. This legislation gives focused guidance to developing a new mechanism promoting shared  accountability based on quality data and clearly defines the expectations and responsibilities of all the partners — the state, schools and school districts.

Quality and consistent data

 

House Bill 2261 begins the process for developing a new data system with the capacity to link multiple data elements at the student, classroom, school, school districts and state level and the flexibility to adapt to evolving needs for information.

• Creates a new and permanent K-12 Data Governance Group.
• Identifies the critical research and policy questions that must be answered to support meaningful education reform and the reports and data that are needed to answer those questions.
• Determines where the current system lacks capability to produce the desired data.
• Develops and designs operating rules and data standards to ensure data is consistent statewide.
• OSPI shall report on data compliance and where data gaps exist and develop a phase-in plan with cost estimates for implementing a comprehensive data improvement system.
• The State Board of Education (SBE) must work with the Education Data Center to determine how to use the new prototypical funding allocation model created in House Bill 2261 as a tool for both allocating resources to schools and districts and as a way for schools and districts to report to the state on how state resources are actually being used.
• Creates no new unfunded mandates on local districts.  Schools and districts are only required to report the data to the extent that they currently have that data.

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