Have you thanked your SIMS manager today?

A series of information sessions was held recently across the state to bring district information managers up to speed on changes to the state's data collection processes (SIMS, EPIMS, SCS). The complete 2011-2012 data collection schedule, including a detailed SIMS schedule and technical documentation can be found here: http://www.doe.mass.edu/infoservices/data/schedule.html.

For those blog readers that don't serve in the information management capacity in their districts, I hope you'll take a quick look at some of the links above. The data collection process is quite complex and time-consuming, so take a moment to acknowlege your district's information managers for taking on this important and time-consuming work!

New SCS Analytical Reports Available in EDW

As I think most everyone knows by now, this year the ESE asked districts to submit student course schedule (SCS) data in addition to the regular collection of student (SIMS) and educator (EPIMS) data.

One of the goals of the SCS (also called SIMS Expansion) project is to provide a series of new analytical reports that examine factors such as class size, teacher and student characteristics, courses of study and other factors on student performance as measured by marks, completion rates and MCAS scores. (This process along with a report preview was presented at the Southeast Data Institute and the presentation and related materials are available online.)

Five of these analytical reports are now available in the EDW in Public Folders > ESE SCS Analytical Reports:

• Classes Taught by Highly Qualified Teachers;


• Teacher Retention by School Poverty Level;


• Class Size by Course Level and by School Poverty Level;


• Course Completions and Passing Rates; and


• Student Marks Distribution by Class Size

Please note that these reports include the certified data for your own district plus statewide data from the 378 districts that certified their collections on time. The EDW team requests that users review the SCS Report Release Notes in that same folder, and understand that these reports may be modified as the data are reviewed.

Data News from MassCUE

I attended one day of the fabulous MassCUE conference at Gillette Stadium on Wednesday 10/28, and wanted to share some of the things I learned. I will come back and post links to the session resources here once they are up on the MassCUE Web site.

I attended a session entitled, "Formative Assessment using Google Apps," presented by the Harwich Public Schools. They have used Google Forms to easily create online quizzes to check student understanding...with instant results tallied to a Google spreadsheet! I have used Google Forms for surveys and the like (similar to Zoomerang and Survey Monkey, but free and unlimited, with data automatically collected in a back end spreadsheet) but it was interesting to see it used to check student understanding and used immediately to inform instruction.

Jeff Comenitz from the ESE's Data Warehouse team had a plethora of information about the DART tool, the growth model, the SIF project, and the new Student Course Schedule (SCS) data collection. (Of course, if you're a follower of this blog, none of these topics are new to you!) He shared some sample teacher-level Data Warehouse reports which are being developed for next fall, once the teacher and student data are connected in the Data Warehouse.

Associate Commissioner Bob Bickerton spoke on "Using Data and New Tools for Decision Making and Continuous Improvement." He highlighted not only the various data collection initiatives (SIMS, EPIMS, SCS, SIF) but also plans for the RTTT-funded "teaching and learning system." He acknowledged the performance challenges that the Data Warehouse is currently encountering, and described how the SLDS grant funds are being used in part to re-architect the Data Warehouse to improve performance and support wider use of the tool.

I spoke with many of the student information system vendors as well as some vendors offering data management tools. I would like to better understand the capabilities of the various systems to handle local data, so that I can help districts in our region understand what options are available to them based on the tools that they may already have in place.

We did get to hear from Jonathan Kraft at lunchtime, however, rain prevented the Patriots from taking the practice field so, sadly, I don't have any Tom Brady sightings to report.

And even more updates...

Yes, it's a busy time of year on the data front! A few more updates are available related to data collection, data resources, and data communication:

• The 2010-2011 Data Collection Schedule has been posted for SIMS, EPIMS, and the new SCS (Student Course Schedule) data collection. I hope to see some of our region's district data managers at the Data Collection Information Session this Friday morning in Duxbury.
  
• The Department has launched a new Parent/Guardian MCAS Information Page.
  
• The DART (District Analysis and Review) Tool has been updated to include 2010 data, and a variety of improvements have been made based on user feedback.

What's the SIMS Expansion All About?

Approximately 75 districts statewide participated during the 2009-2010 school year in the "Expanded SIMS" data collection pilot program. Starting this fall (2010), all districts will be required to collect additional data in a similar manner. But what data is being collected and how will this information be used?

The "Expanded SIMS" title is a bit of a misnomer, since the actual 52 SIMS fields that are currently collected three times per year (October, March, and June) have really not changed.

What is new, however, is the frequency of EPIMS data collection (now three times per year, like SIMS) as well as the new Student Course Schedule (SCS) data collection (also collected three times per year).

The SCS contains 13 new data elements connecting teachers, students, and courses K-12. Many Student Information System vendors have been working to implement processes to facilitate this data collection process, although it will be a significant project for district data managers (especially the first time!). The good news is that SCS information will allow for MCAS reports for 2011-2012 to include course- and teacher-specific reports which are currently not available.

For additional information, please visit the SIMS Expansion page on the ESE Web site. Additional information is being communicated this summer to districts by the Data Collection folks from the ESE.