Data used to be a useful tool in education. But now it’s become a burden for classroom teachers and a stick for school managers to use against their staff.
In 2008, when I was a head of English, I got very excited about using our management information system to demonstrate students’ progress. We did six assessments a year and they got colour-coded. We could easily see who was falling behind. It was ground-breaking, and I felt smug.
Now we’re in the brave new data world, where all staff are computer-literate and schools pay large sums of money every year for a data package. It all seems like a good idea, but the flipside is that data has become a measure of accountability - and a deeply flawed one. It has eroded the trust that used to exist between the best managers and their staff.
Good teachers know the children they teach. They know those who could be working harder. They know the students who might become stressed if too much pressure is put on them. They know the children who can’t work any harder because they’re trying their best. They don’t think about their students in numerical terms. When teachers look at the data for the children they teach - key stage 2 results, predicted progress and grades - they can sometimes feel that those figures bear very little relation to the students they know.
‘Teachers are soft targets’
However, too many managers no longer seem to trust their teachers’ knowledge and professional judgement. As soon as numbers are involved, the solution to improving progress becomes over-simplified: make those numbers bigger!
“Teaching can’t be ‘good’ or ‘outstanding’ because the data isn’t showing enough progress being made,” is a song being sung by too many schools. In other words, teachers are putting on a good show and the children seem attentive, but we don’t trust you to help the students to get good grades. Managers almost seem to think they’re being hoodwinked by good classroom practice.
Then, at least once a year, heads of departments have an uncomfortable meeting with managers during which they try to explain the data. They are asked why a year group, class or individual isn’t making better progress, according to the data. And there isn’t an acceptable answer to this, because the data is telling the only true story. Teachers are asked why their predicted grades aren’t accurate, when in recent years they’ve been predicting according to a new grading system and an untried specification.
And teachers are a soft target: you can control teachers because you’re paying them. You can’t control students because you don’t live with them.
‘Sweeping statements based on data’
Some schools are blessed with a great data manager who actually understands the data package and how to use it best. But many school leaders, if they’re honest, find it hard to really “unpick” the data, so they make tabloid assumptions - “No-one’s making ANY progress!” - and issue sweeping statements.
And where does the onus for changing the numbers and “improving” the data fall? On classroom teachers. Of course, teachers should help their students to succeed, but what about shifting some of the burden to the students themselves? And their parents, who also often become word-blind when there’s a number to look at.
Will the fact that you’re on top of the data make the children in your classroom more likely to succeed?
Yes, managers - go into lessons and see the good practice that goes on in your school. If some of those lessons fall short, take steps to improve the methods of that teacher. But having watched an interesting lesson in which the students were clearly engaged in learning, believe the evidence of your professional senses; don’t say ‘It can’t have been a good lesson’ just because of the data.
Fiona Folan is a former head of department and school leader
