What's it all about?

This coming academic year will be the second year that the GSIS MS has existed as its own division within GSIS, and the fourth year that GSIS has been serving students in Suwon. This is a great time for us to begin collecting and analyzing data that will assist us in our process of growth and improvement.

During the summer I enjoyed lots of quality reading time, both personal and professional, and I took this opportunity to study ASCD's Educational Leadership journal entitled, 'Data - Now What?' I was very interested in reading some research on how schools have been using data and what sorts of data is being collected. I believe that successful schools are more than just high test scores, however, educational data is offered referred to through this narrow lense.

I found it very refreshing to read Douglas B. Reeves's article, "Looking Deeper into the Data", at the end of which he states, "Similarly, student test-score data is only one piece of a complex puzzle. There are, after all, faces, names, and real lives behind the data." As I continued to read through and reflect on the articles in this journal there was a definite recurring theme, that gathering and analyzing data without asking why can actually be detrimental to the improvement process.

As we begin this year it is very important for us to remember that each day we are dealing with real people, real emotions, and real stories, all of which can impact test scores and other numbers that our data may show. We certainly need to make informed decisions based on the data, but we also need to ensure that we have investigated the stories, emotions, and the people behind the numbers so that we are using the whole picture to make these decisions. After all, the people are what it's all about.

Reference: Reeves, D. B. (2008) Looking Deeper Into the Data Educational Leadership, Vol 66, No 4, pp 89-90.