Interventions Promoting Educators’ Use of Data: Research Insights and Gaps

• In Event: Promoting Data Use in Education: Promises and Pitfalls

Abstract

In recent years, educators have recognized the need to proactively foster the use of data to guide educational decision-making and practice. Understanding that data alone will not guarantee use, individuals have invested in interventions to support better access to, interpretation of, and responses to data of all kinds. Despite these efforts, there has been little systematic examination of research on them. This paper seeks to address this gap by synthesizing what we currently know about interventions to support data use—ranging from comprehensive, system-level initiatives to more narrowly focused interventions.

The paper summarizes what is what is known across 41 studies about the design and implementation of these interventions, their effects at individual and organizational levels, and conditions shown to affect implementation and outcomes. All studies were selected based on systematic criteria, then summarized and coded to identify the study methods, intervention design, and findings on implementation, effects, and constraining and enabling conditions.

Regardless of type, the review finds that the process thrives when interventions ensure that data are easy to understand and usable; include norms and structures promoting the safety and confidentiality of data and data discussions; target multiple leverage points; and involve opportunities for cross-site collaboration. The research further indicates that interventions frequently face several persistent challenges, such as developing support that is generic but also customized and conceptual but also concrete; establishing the appropriate role of accountability; and sustaining and maintaining depth of data support over time. Ultimately, the review finds mixed findings and level of research evidence on the effects of data- support interventions, with relatively more evidence on the effects of interventions on educators’ knowledge, skills, and practice than on the effects on organizations or student achievement. Finally, this research begins to suggest a set of common conditions that influence the implementation and effects of data support interventions, including the capacity of the intervener, factors related to the organization, broader policy context, characteristics of the focal data, and user beliefs, knowledge, and relationships. The paper concludes with a framework for understanding interventions and suggested directions for future research.

Author

• Julie A. Marsh, University of Southern California