The community college environment is complex and dynamic, requiring constant monitoring. To ensure that workforce education, a core component of community colleges' missions, remains aligned with colleges' environments, responsive to employers' needs, suited to students' interests and abilities, and current in content and technology, it is…

Many districts are expanding and diversifying the school options available to parents--a trend that shows no signs of reversing. While all public schools are required to test and publically report results, it remains nearly impossible for families and education and civic leaders to make school-to-school comparisons, especially across district-run…

The Academic Knowledge Management Model of Small Schools in Thailand was created by research and development. The quantitative and qualitative data were collected via the following steps: a participatory workshop meeting, the formation of a team according to knowledge base, field study, brainstorming, group discussion, activities carried out…

This brief describes how investments in student data systems are taking family engagement and student achievement to a whole new level. In addition to addressing areas where a student most needs improvement, the data can serve as a catalyst for home-school communication. Parents benefit from having information about key indicators on which they…

The Centers of Excellence (COE) provide regional workforce data on high growth, high demand industries and occupations for use by community colleges in program planning and resource enhancement. This article discusses the environmental scanning research methodology and its application to data-driven decision making in community college program…

Early education leaders--inside and outside of government--are looking for new ways to improve quality, accountability, and efficiency across many different programs serving young children and their families, and they see investment in data systems as a pivotal part of that effort. However, it can be challenging to develop and implement effective…

Two purposes for early childhood assessment systems are informing program development and providing accountability. Based on findings from a case study of a local Head Start program implementing the National Reporting System (NRS) in 2004-2005, we provide 5 lessons learned from experiences with the NRS that may have implications for other…

In order for research programs at academic medical centers and universities to survive and thrive in the increasingly challenging economic, political and regulatory environment, successful transformation is extremely important. Transformation and quality management techniques are increasingly well established in medical practice organizations. In…

Centring on the application of information and communication technology (ICT) in Chinese higher education, this paper discusses the development of e-campus in Chinese universities from three different aspects: campus network infrastructure and various management information systems; three modes of e-learning and its application in higher education…

The Head Start National Reporting System (NRS) exemplified an assessment system where significant ambiguity existed regarding its purpose(s). This article considers the perceived purposes of the NRS from a local program perspective through observations and interviews with staff members during the 2004-2005 school year. This study found that a…

When the author and his colleagues last left Chicago Public Schools (CPS) and Texas' Plano Independent School District in April 2008, both school districts were immersed in the long and labored advance toward becoming a fully matured data-driven operation, one that uses sophisticated technologies to gather data, sort and interpret it, and…

Education leaders across the country confront a growing challenge: too many students are not college ready when they leave high school. Although indicators exist to identify students at risk of dropping out of high school, few indicators of students' college readiness are currently in place, and few districts have linked indicators to practices…

This paper describes an information system for managerial decision making which attempts to satisfy the data requirements of all 12 mental health comprehensive services. The essential characteristics of an on-line computer information system are presented with the emphasis upon the use of the system by directors and managers for program planning,…

The final summary of the progress, accomplishments, findings, and recommendations of a project to develop and implement a management information system for long-range planning of vocational education at the local level is presented in this report. Goals and purposes of the original proposal are stated and their development traced in research, work…

The project was designed to investigate sources of available data on the incidence, prevalence, diagnostic conditions, functional limitations, and activity restrictions of the disabled population in the United States, and to design a comprehensive data system. Difficulties, both conceptual and practical in estimating incidence and prevalence are…