Data Warehousing: How to Make Your Statistics Meaningful
- By William Flaherty
- 02/01/01
Can you show standardized test results by certain groups of students for multiple years? Can you provide each teacher with past standardized test results for each student in his or her classes? Can you provide each student with a realistic prediction of what GPA and SAT are needed for admission to certain colleges? If your district cannot allow all administrators to produce the answers to these questions quickly and easily, you might be interested in a new technology now available to schools that can do this and much more. This technology is called data warehousing.
Hanover County Public Schools (HCPS), Ashland, VA, has created an Instructional Decision Support System (IDSS). This system combines information from many disparate data systems and incorporates them into a common repository that is available to administrators throughout the school district. The student information system is linked to attendance, discipline, grade point average, transcripts, standardized tests, and student surveys.
What and Why
The data warehousing movement began with a book by Bill Inmon in 1992, Building the Data Warehouse. Inmon’s definition of a data warehouse is, “A subject-oriented, integrated, time variant, non-volatile, collection of data in support of management’s decision-making process.” The last part of this definition should be the most appealing to school administrators today.
We are in the midst of high-stakes testing and school accountability. The next wave of reform that is about to wash upon our shores is data-based decision-making. This is a natural evolution that will assist us in making decisions for the right reasons. Until now administrators have not had the tools needed to analyze the vast amounts of information that are generated from one set of standardized tests. This task grows exponentially when one attempts to examine multiple years of data, multiple tests, specific groups of children, special programs, attendance, discipline, teacher training, etc. The proper data warehouse solution can allow you easily to sift through all this data, with a few clicks of a mouse.
A view from the balcony of a data warehouse is that of different data sources (main student database, state standardized tests, Stanford tests, SAT, ACT, district-generated data) feeding into a robust database housed on a powerful server that is accessible to administrators throughout the district. The final key component is a user-friendly interface that will allow non-technical people to access the information easily from their computer. Due to recent advances, this solution now has a price point that is affordable for most school districts.
Process and People
Hanover County Public Schools’ quest began in the summer of 1999 with a simple school board goal: “Promote instructional programming in the following areas, among others: implications of longitudinal assessment of student achievement.” This lead to the formation of a committee chaired by the school superintendent, Dr. Stewart Roberson, which examined means of attaining this goal.
The composition of this committee consisted of a school board member and members from both the instructional and technology organizations within the school district. David Papenfuse, Assistant Superintendent of Finance and Technology, and Dr. Lloyd Jones, Assistant Superintendent of Instruction, headed the team from technology and instruction respectively. This makeup was of vital importance in the success of the project. The data warehouse was operational by the summer of 2000. Virtually all administrators in HCPS’s 19 schools and central office were trained by December 1, 2000. HCPS has the in-house expertise to maintain the warehouse and support the user base.
HCPS took very deliberate steps to accomplish this in a short time frame. These steps included evaluation of database software for the warehouse; selection of the database software; training of technical staff for both the database and the data warehousing features of the database; evaluation of end user software; selection of software; training of technical staff in installation, setup, and security of end user software; focus groups with principals; survey of potential users; introduction of the Instructional Decision Support System at the annual administrative retreat; and training of administrators. Although all steps are necessary, it is particularly important to involve administrators in the process and to incorporate their suggestions as you develop this information delivery system. HCPS administrators were anxious to have a solution that would aid in the arduous task of examining our state standardized tests.
In Virginia, school districts receive a composite score and individual skills tested scores for each student. An example of this would be the composite score for the fifth-grade math test and its skills of computation and estimation; measurement and geometry; probability and statistics; patterns, functions, and algebra; and number and number sense scores. With the new data warehouse, a principal can generate a report in minutes that will produce averages and minimum and maximum scores for the composite and the five categories. The drag of a mouse enhances this report so that it can be examined by gender, socioeconomic background, disability, or any other indicator that is in the database.
The System in Use
Stephen Goldsmith, principal of Washington-Henry Elementary School, is examining the Stanford test scores of fourth-graders to see if they can be predictors for students at risk of failing Virginia’s fifth-grade state tests. His plan is to tailor his school’s curriculum and special programs to meet the needs of these students. The data warehouse technology allows him and his staff to provide customized curricula according to the skill level of these students. Dr. Carol Cash, principal of Lee-Davis High School, provides her Algebra II teachers with a roster of their students with their Algebra I composite scores and all its scores by skill from the state test. This gives the Algebra II teachers a good indication of the skill level of each student in the class. What would it take for you to provide the same information to your teachers? Cash generates these reports in approximately 10 minutes.
The district believes that it is imperative to the success of the project to have a person dedicated to the building and maintenance of the data warehouse. We also believe that the training received by the technical staff is invaluable. The district trainer developed an initial two-day module, complete with manual, for the district administrators. This training was customized to allow each participant to use school data to develop custom reports for his or her educational practices. At every training session at least one participant exclaimed that he generated a report in 10-15 minutes that took him a week to produce last year! A follow-up day of training is planned for March, 2001.
A user group is being formed that will meet every other month. The meetings will provide the members with new tips and tricks from the district trainer and allow time for sharing of technical skills learned and insights gained into the instructional program. Dr. Carole Urbansok-Eads, Director of Guidance, Testing, and Research, provided a valuable session dealing with the types of statistical analysis that are valid and pitfalls to avoid.
Nuts and Bolts
The two key pieces of software that HCPS selected for this project are Microsoft’s SQL Server 7.0 and Business Objects. This month the district will upgrade SQL Server 7.0 to SQL Server 2000. The end user software is called Business Objects .
Business Objects is a powerful tool because it allows novices to generate meaningful reports and it allows users with advanced statistical knowledge to produce even more sophisticated information. This software also allows the school district to produce standard reports that are held in a repository and are available to each school. These reports are templates. When they are used, they prompt the user to select the appropriate school and then generate the report for that school. The administrator can then either use the canned reports or do additional “what-ifs” with the basic information generated. These reports can be saved at the building level for later use or enhancement.
Business Objects can be purchased as a Web implementation, but HCPS chose to use the client-server version of the software. A powerful, secure server, located on the district’s wide-area network, hosts the SQL database in a Microsoft NT environment. The client software, Business Objects, is loaded on each administrator’s desktop. Business Objects, SQL Server, and NT authenticate a required login and password. Information in the data warehouse is read-only. Other than district-generated reports, all work is saved at the building level. A report can be saved to a laptop. The computer can then be disconnected from the network. Any reports saved can then be further analyzed in an off-line mode.
Coping With Challenges
The district faced several challenges while implementing this solution. Identifying the data elements for the warehouse was key.
Each element has a cost, monetarily and human. Great effort has been and is being expended to minimize the effort required to keep information accurate. The initial migrating of data from the different sources into the SQL database was both tedious and time consuming. Staying focused on specifics was difficult when dealing with overwhelming amounts of information. Freeing up all district administrators for two days of training was an intricate task.
The most difficult task in the future will be to maintain current and accurate data. All student information is entered at the building level, 19 schools with multiple individuals inputting information at each site. Data stewards, the person(s) most responsible for the information, will be charged with insuring the accuracy of particular data sets.
Limiting data will always be a challenge. Before any new element is added to the warehouse, a committee will review it. By definition, a data warehouse contains no “live” data. The goal is to refresh the system with relevant data once a week. Standardized test scores need be entered only once, when they are received. Evaluation of new techniques and user satisfaction will be a continuing effort.
There are many advantages of Hanover County Public Schools’ Instructional Decision Support System. It is easy to use. Administrators have a fast and easy way to receive information not available in the past. Customized reports can be generated and saved. The IDSS allows instructional leaders to make decisions based on information. This in turn leads to improved student performance, the goal of educators everywhere.
Bill Flaherty is the Director of Technology Services for Hanover County Public Schools near Richmond, VA. He has served as a Director for two different school districts since 1987. His e-mail address is <>