arrien.davison's blog

Quick Guide to OSSE’s Data Stewardship and Data Governance

arrien.davison — Mon, 28 Apr 2025 16:58:29 +0000

DAR

Monday, April 28, 2025 - 1:00pm

You may have heard the word “steward” as related to the land and our environment. To “steward” is to take care of, to nurture. Being a data steward at OSSE is not a job title; it is a responsibility to take care of OSSE data. Because OSSE data, as we’ve said in previous blog entries, is more than data – it represents important information about people, whether a child, student, parent/guardian or faculty or a staff member of a school or child development facility.

Whether you are an OSSE staff member responsible for a single data asset or a data user accessing our datasets for research, data stewardship is just one important aspect of everyone’s responsibility to protect and care for the data.

At OSSE, our data governance structures and data stewardship practices work in tandem to maintain a delicate balance between increased demand for and availability of high-quality education data and the legal and ethical requirements to preserve individual privacy.

While individual states have the latitude to create their own data policies and implement procedures that meet the needs of their unique educational landscape, data governance is the common thread. OSSE works in community with other state education agencies (SEAs) across the country to share ideas and strengthen our data privacy and data governance practice.

Data governance is the approach OSSE takes to make decisions about and formalize data policies and processes that span the full life cycle of data, from collection to access and use, and from storage and secure sharing to disposal. Data governance ensures that all the District’s education data are managed and used in accordance with our data policies and through shared, strategic, and consistent data practices across the agency.

OSSE regularly convenes a Data Governance Committee (DGC), which is a formal group comprising appointed representatives from all OSSE divisions. In consultation with the OSSE Leadership Team, the DGC sets the data policy and determines data processes for the agency. The DGC also reviews the performance of the data stewardship program.

Data stewardship is the method by which OSSE ensures we are implementing our data policies and processes with fidelity. This includes consistently, efficiently, and effectively managing our data, making it available to stakeholders, and using it to its full capacity. Data stewards are the individuals who know the data best; they have decision-making authority over a data asset and serve as the primary caretakers of our data. While a business data steward is the programmatic expert of a data asset, a technical data steward is responsible for the operational management of a data asset.

OSSE uses a Stewardship by Asset model (Figure 1). In this model, the data asset is at the heart of our data governance program and stewardship practices. Each data asset has a single business data steward and a single technical data steward assigned. Individual stewards are typically part of a team, and those teams comprise our agency’s 12 divisions.

Data governance at OSSE relies on having a strong community of data stewards who diligently implement our data policies and care for the data flowing through every division in our agency. The stewardship of data by this community is vital to maintaining student privacy and improving quality and confidence in OSSE data, which leads to improved data-driven decision-making to support children, students, and educators, and creating a lasting and positive impact on the people and communities we serve.

Learn More

For more about data privacy, see previous Data Discovery posts about FERPA.

OSSE Suppression Policy – How It Started, How It’s Going

arrien.davison — Tue, 15 Apr 2025 18:02:28 +0000

DAR

Tuesday, April 15, 2025 - 1:45pm

The “how it started, how it’s going” meme started on social media in 2020 (according to information on the internet), the same year that the ��ѻ��ý of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE) adopted its Student Privacy and Data Suppression Policy. Coincidence? Probably. But five years later seems like an opportunity to put that meme to good use.

What is suppression? In education data, “suppression” refers to methods used to protect personally identifiable information (PII) about children and students, part of OSSE’s responsibilities under the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA). This can also be called “disclosure avoidance.”

In action, this means that when releasing aggregate data (such as at the state, local education agency [LEA], school or child development facility level [CDF]), OSSE obscures certain information to prevent the identification of individual children and students. Typically, this is reflected in notations (such as n<10, data suppressed [DS], <5%, >=90%) in OSSE data sets.

How it Started

All aggregate data releases – whether at the state, LEA, school or CDF level – carry some risk of accidental exposure of individual identities. In other words, no suppression method can completely and perfectly eliminate all risk.

But with a focus on continuous improvement, OSSE identified the need for and developed a policy that would:

Enhance the balance between transparency to the public and OSSE’s legal responsibility to protect student privacy;
Improve equity in showing growth, even small growth, in LEAs, schools and student groups;
Improve consistency in how OSSE suppresses data across projects and releases;
Increase the efficiency and speed of producing and reviewing data through process standardization; and
Improve OSSE's ability to analyze and share data and explain data and data practices to stakeholders and the public.

Specifically, the policy:

Reports denominators of fewer than 10 children or students (and any corresponding percentages) as n<10;
Requires “blurred” or inexact percentages (such as <=10% and >=90%) for very high and very low percentages, based on the denominator;
Implements complementary suppression (noted as “DS”) to mask data that would be able to be calculated by simple math using other values in the data set;
Prohibits the publication of values of 0, 0% or 100%, which would reveal data about all children and students at a school, LEA, or CDF; and
Recognizes exceptions for low-risk data, such as enrollment data by race, ethnicity, gender, and grade.

How it’s going

In looking at implementation over the last five years, it’s clear that OSSE’s suppression policy has met many of its main goals, including:

Improving child and student privacy in OSSE aggregate data releases;
Aligning expectations across the agency about how OSSE suppresses agency data sets released to the public;
Increasing process standardization, which has improved the efficiency of producing and reviewing data sets for public release; and
Strengthening documentation of OSSE data practices and data governance and privacy at OSSE.

It also sparked the development of a companion policy that applies to the release of data about the educational workforce.

Other learnings include:

While mostly a technical practice, suppression is also part art, relying on human judgment, especially when weighing the risks of specific data releases.
A policy needs continuous care and feeding; no policy can anticipate all of the use cases (or thorny edge cases) that require additional analysis.

For More Information

For more information, email OSSE.Datasharing@dc.gov or visit Student Privacy and Data Suppression Policy At A Glance or Data Governance and Privacy at OSSE.

The DC Survey About Your School (DC SAYS) – how did we get here?

arrien.davison — Thu, 10 Apr 2025 17:08:01 +0000

Thursday, April 10, 2025 - 1:00pm

As you may already know, the ��ѻ��ý of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE) administers the DC School Report Card, which shares comparable data we have about public schools, local education agencies (LEAs) and the District with the public. We are required by federal law to provide a state report card, and the DC State Board of Education (SBOE) has authority over the data elements that we put on the website. For years, we had been hearing from the public for school climate survey data, but we did not have a tool to collect these data. We have been working behind the scenes across our agency to make it happen, so when the SBOE passed a resolution requiring school climate survey data, we were ready. The first District-wide school survey, the DC Survey About Your School (DC SAYS), is here!

In spring 2025, for the first time, DC students in grades 3 and above, school-based staff, and parents/caregivers are taking a statewide school climate survey. We will publish an overview of the results on the DC School Report Card in December 2025.

Defining School Culture and Climate

OSSE defines school culture as the prevailing norms, actions, values, and routines cultivated and actively promoted by a school community, including interpersonal relationships, teaching and learning practices, and organizational structures. School climate is a product of school culture and forms the experience of students, parents, and educators in the school community. Together, school culture and climate (SCC) can create positive, welcoming, and inclusive environments where all students are prepared to succeed in school and in life.

What We Are Asking

The surveys will cover a lot of ground, as demonstrated by the table of topics below (each topic has 5-7 questions):

The questions are written to be accessible and age appropriate and are available in seven languages. Accommodations to meet individual student needs, like read aloud, are easily available. OSSE has two unique questions about safety and attendance, but all other questions have been trialed in other states and districts by our vendor (Panorama Education). OSSE also developed a survey specifically for adult students. You can see the content of all of the surveys on our school climate survey website.

Piloting the Surveys

The surveys have been vetted by our LEAs. In spring 2024, OSSE convened an Advisory Cohort of 16 LEAs to pilot the surveys and listen to feedback about the content, administration and supports. These LEAs administered the surveys and gave OSSE feedback every month. (We also supported them with School Climate Enhancement Grants, which you can read about here.) For the spring 2024 administration, OSSE only had access to participation data from the Advisory Cohort – only the LEAs could see their own data and comparisons to the group overall. OSSE was happy to see that the demographics from our Advisory Cohort aligned closely with the demographics of the District overall (see below).

Another encouraging sign was the time it took folks to complete the survey. We do not want these surveys to be a drag for schools to administer or for people to take; OSSE understands that there are a lot of surveys that LEAs and schools are being asked to complete and distribute. The median time for students, as well as school-based staff, to complete the survey was around 10 minutes. Parents/caregivers only needed six minutes, and we shortened the survey, as well.

Surveys in 2025

The first DC SAYS window ran from Feb. 24-April 4, 2025. OSSE provided promotional flyers, blurbs and a parent notification letter in multiple languages on our school climate survey resources website. If you have any questions or concerns, please email Ben.Peisch@dc.gov.

What Trends are we Seeing in Enrollment?

arrien.davison — Tue, 25 Mar 2025 15:26:10 +0000

DAR

Tuesday, March 25, 2025 - 11:00am

Over the past seven years, the District has seen notable shifts in public school enrollment patterns across its public and public charter schools. These trends are likely due to changing demographics, community preferences, high mobility between neighboring metropolitan areas, and external influences, such as the COVID-19 pandemic. Through the 2019-20 school year (SY2019-20) enrollment in DC schools saw consistent growth, driven particularly by increased investments in public education, improved charter school options, and a growing population of young families in the district. The 2020-21 school year marked a decline in enrollment, particularly in the early childhood grades (Pre-K and Kindergarten). Many families opted for alternative schooling options, including homeschooling or private schools during the height of the pandemic (��ѻ��ýschooling on the Rise During COVID-19 Pandemic). Post-pandemic, enrollment began recovering in SY2021-22 but has yet to fully return to pre-pandemic levels for all grades. Although, overall enrollment has increased steadily from SY2022-23 through SY2024-25, there are variations in growth by grade. To unmask and understand this occurrence, it is important to do grade-level analyses and assess which grades have increased/decreased year over year.

Overall, high school enrollment has shown the most resilience. Comparing SY2018-19 to SY2024-25, grades with the largest increases in enrollment were Grade 10 (1,254), Grade 09 (1,146), Grade 11 (867), and Grade 8 (862). This trend could be explained by OSSE’s sizable investments in postsecondary education programming as well as Career and Technical Education (CTE). OSSE investments include the federal $21 million Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs (GEAR UP) grant, opening of the Advanced Technical Center (ATC), Advanced Internship Program (AIP) and Career Readiness Internships (CRI), and the continuation of the DC Tuition Assistance Grant (DCTAG) and Mayor’s Scholars programs. Lastly, we have seen a large increase in enrollment for adult students (870). Adult education programs are dedicated to District residents who want to re-engage the educational process, whether this is to earn a General Educational Development (GED) certificate or to enroll in Postsecondary/Career Education/Training programs. The demand for adult services could be spurred on by the increased demand for workforce skills, career advancement, and lifelong learning. For example, the Division of Early Learning (DEL) made substantial investments in credential attainment for early childhood teachers/leaders. Adult programs also are more likely to offer flexible learning options, such as online courses, which makes it easier for adults to integrate into their daily lives.

Conversely, grades with the steepest decrease in enrollment were Pre-K 3 (-516), Pre-K 4 (-309), Grade 1 (-222), and Kindergarten (-205). The large fluctuations in early elementary enrollment can be explained by historically low birthrates in the district. Birthrates have consistently declined since the 1990s, except from 2006 to 2016. This increase in births during this period helps account for some of the larger increases in middle school and high school enrollment. Otherwise, the number of births has decreased per year. Given this, we should expect these numbers to decrease in a succinct pattern with birth rates year over year.

Learn More

You can read more about enrollment in our annual Enrollment Audit Reports. The SY2024-25 report is available here; past reports are all linked in the Enrollment section of our Data and Reports page. The underlying data files are available here.

Frequently Asked Questions About FERPA and Student Privacy

arrien.davison — Tue, 11 Feb 2025 15:03:29 +0000

DAR

Tuesday, February 11, 2025 - 10:00am

Working with public education data means working with the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA), a federal law that protects the privacy of and access to personally identifiable information (PII) in student education records.

At the same time, ��ѻ��ý of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE) data is more than data – it represents important information about people, whether a child, student, parent/guardian or faculty or a staff member of a school or child development facility.

OSSE interprets its responsibilities under FERPA in OSSE and Federal Privacy Laws and in accordance with guidance issued by the US Department of Education’s Privacy Technical Assistance Center (PTAC). FERPA requires parent/guardian consent to release data from a student’s education records to a third party but also allows some exceptions to this consent requirement. Some of these exceptions apply to OSSE, as the state education agency (SEA) and local education agencies (LEAs) and schools; other exceptions apply only to LEAs and schools.

Over the years, stakeholders – from both inside and outside of OSSE – have brought the agency many interesting questions about FERPA, data sharing and student privacy. Here are some recent highlights.

Q: Can OSSE share student data as directory information?

A: No. OSSE does not have enrolled students, so it does not have “directory information,” as defined by FERPA. LEAs and schools can use this FERPA exception to the parent/guardian consent requirement but not OSSE.

Q: Can OSSE share data with other organizations, such as program evaluators, it designates as “school officials” under FERPA?

A: No. Only LEAs and schools can use this exception to FERPA’s parent/guardian consent requirement to share student data.

Q: Does FERPA permit OSSE to share information about a student’s immigration status?

A: OSSE does not collect information about a student or family’s immigration status, and therefore, cannot share data it does not have. Under FERPA, it would be illegal for a school or LEA to share that data without parent/guardian consent or a court order.

Q: Is OSSE required to share student information with military recruiters?

A: No, but there is a requirement for LEAs and schools that receive funds under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA, as amended). Under the law, they are required to comply with a request by a military recruiter for secondary students’ names, addresses, and telephone numbers, in accordance with their policy on directory information.

Q: Can researchers with a data sharing agreement with OSSE retain data after their study is finished if they need it for another project?

A: No. FERPA requires researchers to destroy data from student education records “when no longer needed for the specific purpose for which it was disclosed and a time period for that destruction.”

Q: Is health information maintained by the school nurse protected by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)?

A: No. Joint guidance from the US Department of Education and US Department of Health and Human Services makes clear that health data in school records is, in most cases, protected by FERPA and not HIPAA.

Learn More

For more information about OSSE’s policies and practices, please visit our Data Governance and Privacy page.

For more information about the differences in FERPA requirements for SEAs and LEAs, please visit this page.

If you would like more information or ask questions, please email us at OSSE.Datasharing@dc.gov.

Data-Informed Decisions: Strengthening High-Impact Tutoring (HIT) for Better Student Outcomes

arrien.davison — Fri, 07 Feb 2025 15:50:45 +0000

TAL

Friday, February 7, 2025 - 10:45am

The ��ѻ��ý of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE) has led a $40 million investment over four years to support the expansion of HIT programs across the District, with a focus on students who are furthest from opportunity. OSSE and Mayor Muriel Bowser announced $7 million of this investment to sustain these efforts after a three-year pilot period concluded in September 2024. These funds will support HIT programs for students across 90 DC public and public charter schools this year, prioritizing students who are identified as economically disadvantaged. OSSE prioritizes data to inform strategy and drive better outcomes for students. The HIT initiative is a particularly strong example of OSSE’s commitment to iterative and evidence-based decision-making. Throughout the past three years of program implementation, OSSE has regularly modified the HIT strategy based on learnings from qualitative and quantitative data analysis.

Maximizing HIT Dosage

Analysis of HIT attendance indicated that dosage is a key lever for impact. Students who received 20 or more sessions of HIT closed the achievement gap between themselves and their non-tutored peers by a larger magnitude than those who received fewer than 20 sessions. Tutoring conducted outside of school time, or in community-based sites, had lower average attendance and dosage levels than students who received HIT during the school day. Therefore, to maximize dosage, OSSE’s fiscal year 2025 (FY25) grants and contracts only support programs that occur in schools and prioritize those embedded into the school day and offer more than 16 weeks of programming. OSSE provided more funding and prioritized grant proposals for HIT programs that ran for 20 or more weeks. By encouraging fund recipients to engage in tutoring aligned with existing school schedules, OSSE-funded HIT meets students where they are and reduces barriers to participation. The goal is for this shift is to lead to improved consistency and engagement.

Funding Local Education Agencies (LEAs) Directly

Another key update to OSSE’s HIT strategy came from a close review of program compliance and implementation data. In the past, OSSE mainly funded community-based tutoring service providers to implement HIT programming. However, LEAs are primarily responsible for student learning, and they play a vital role in building trust with students, teachers, families, and school communities. Recognizing this, OSSE adjusted the HIT funding approach to direct the majority of FY25 HIT funds to LEAs, which can be leveraged to implement staff-led or third-party tutoring programs that best meet student needs. This change was also informed by a cost model analysis, which found that school staff-led programming can be more cost-effective than the HIT programs implemented by third-party tutoring providers. By empowering LEAs to take ownership of program implementation, OSSE aims to improve accountability, streamline data reporting, and strengthen buy-in from educators and parents alike. Another feature of utilizing school staff as tutors is that they may already know the students, have teaching expertise, and understand the curriculum, allowing them to align tutoring with classroom instruction effectively. This shift ensures HIT programs are not only compliant with reporting requirements and program implementation standards, but also deeply connected to each school’s goals and priorities.

Incorporating Virtual Tutoring into HIT Strategy

Another lesson learned through recent national research is that live online tutoring can positively affect student achievement if it meets evidence-based standards. Historically, most LEAs in the District have not had an appetite for virtual tutoring, and therefore OSSE funded only in-person tutoring in the first three years of the initiative. In FY25, online tutoring is eligible for support through grants and contracts, as long as an in-person tutoring coordinator supports the online, synchronous tutoring sessions, so that schools have access to remote options if they are interested.

The Path Ahead

As OSSE continues to refine the approach to HIT, maximizing student growth remains crucial, with sustainability as a central focus. Lessons learned about effective practices have informed the prioritization of strategies that drive long-term success and continuous improvement. By leveraging data, fostering strong partnerships with LEAs, and aligning resources to maximize impact, the aim is to support models that are both effective and enduring.

Quick Guide to Student Mobility Data in the District

arrien.davison — Fri, 31 Jan 2025 13:31:41 +0000

DAR

Friday, January 31, 2025 - 8:30am

The District of Columbia’s education ecosystem is unique. Families have the ability to choose a school that is right for their student and each of the District’s 69 local education agencies can set their own enrollment policies. This means that students can transition across schools during and between school years.* Additionally, the District’s small geographic footprint means that students may move only a few miles but move out of or into the District’s boundaries and therefore also move out of or into the District’s school systems.

Given these factors and the impact that transitioning schools can have on students, the ��ѻ��ý of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE) has always been interested in understanding the enrollment patterns and mid-year mobility of District students. OSSE has published mobility data since the 2012-13 school year – first in the DC Equity Reports and then on the DC School Report Card. These reports show cumulative entries and exits by month, represented as a percent of the school’s enrollment as of the annual enrollment audit.

However, OSSE heard from stakeholders that more information was needed about where students were going and where they were coming from. In order to provide OSSE’s partners with more information about student mobility, OSSE has published files with more granular enrollment data for each school year from 2018-19 to 2023-24 and OSSE will continue to update these files on an annual basis moving forward. These files include information, by sector, on transfers to and from a different sector, out-of-state, or juvenile justice settings; it also includes information on transfers within a sector. The files include these breakdowns for all students, compulsory-age students, K-12 students, pre-K students, and adult students.

The graph below shows the net enrollment changes in each school year by sector and grade band. The dotted lines represent enrollment in the charter sector and the solid lines represent changes in enrollment in DC Public Schools (DCPS). The graph highlights the changes in mobility during the COVID-19 public health emergency, particularly in the 2020-21 school year when students mostly attend school virtually and net enrollment changes were smaller than in other years across all grade bands and sectors. Since 2020-21, net enrollment changes have grown to be greater than they were prior to the pandemic, in the 2018-19 school year.

OSSE will continue to work with our partners across DC to ensure that every student has a great place to go to school and to support students, families and educators when transitions between schools occur.

*The District of Columbia Public Schools (DCPS) serves as DC’s by-right local education agency (LEA) where every child of compulsory age (5) has a right to attend a given school based on their address regardless of the date of enrollment. Each public charter school (PCS) sets their own enrollment policies and determines whether they open available seats via MySchool DC and enroll students throughout the year.

National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP): A Primer

arrien.davison — Thu, 23 Jan 2025 14:50:17 +0000

DAR

Thursday, January 23, 2025 - 9:30am

There are no shortages when it comes to government acronyms, especially in assessment. Keeping track of them all, however, can be a test all on its own. So, to prep you for the upcoming public scores release on January 29, let’s walk through what “NAEP” is, what it stands for, and why OSSE cares about what these scores have to say.

If you’ve never heard of it: NAEP stands for the National Assessment of Educational Progress. It has a few aliases, but the most common one is The Nation’s Report Card. While glib, this nickname isn’t wholly inaccurate: NAEP aims to measure how well students across the nation perform in certain subject matters, most commonly math and reading, but other subjects, like civics, science, and US history, have all been assessed in the past. By looking at the NAEP scores, both historical and the ones about to be released, OSSE can get an idea of the achievement of District students nationally and District-wide as a current snapshot and compare them to past performances.

So, NAEP is an assessment? Yes, correct! NAEP is primarily an assessment in mathematics and reading for fourth- and eighth-grade students. While 12th grade has been assessed, and other subjects have been assessed, those two subjects and grades are constant across all years. NAEP has been around since 1969 but how it exists in its current form began in the 1990s. Students everywhere in the United States have been taking the NAEP assessment for more than 30 years, which gives OSSE an immense amount of data and the ability to look through time and see quantifiable progress. This is actually one of the core tenets of why NAEP exists: Because it has been around for decades, and because the assessment is the same for everyone, OSSE has the unique ability to look at NAEP scores as a proxy for which direction students’ learning is headed. While you might not remember it, it is very possible you took NAEP in school.

Who takes NAEP? Everyone? Not necessarily. NAEP operates every year, but not every year is the same scale. NAEP has a two-year cycle – one year is a “big” year, with lots of schools sampled, and one year is a "small" year with few, if any schools that are sampled. The exact number of students and schools that get picked vary from state to state, but here in the District, OSSE can get some approximations. In a "big" year, which now fall on even years, anywhere from 90-150 schools can be sampled, with the number of students taking the one-day assessment being counted in the thousands. In a "small" year, on odd years, DC might have only a small handful of schools sampled, with only a couple hundred students possibly being sampled. Some small years, DC schools aren’t sampled at all!

So, will we see how well our kids did? How does that make it different than some other test like DC CAPE? Actually … no! Individual scores aren’t released. Neither are school scores, or even as high as the local education agency (LEA) level. NAEP will only ever release scores in three ways – (1) nationally, (2) statewide, and (3) occasionally in large city format. That means NAEP is important to DC in three different ways. OSSE will see how well the country as a whole is doing, how well DC the “state” does, and how well DC performs as a city. All three are different, but DC the “state” and DC the “city” are usually pretty close in performance. State scores include everyone in the city: public schools, charter schools, and any private schools that want to participate. City scores are only DC public schools. Each are valuable in their own way, and OSSE can extract a lot from each of those data releases.

Note: In those small years, OSSE only ever gets national-level scores. NAEP can be a logistical undertaking, so OSSE uses those small years to do all sorts of things to keep NAEP valid, like doing pilot tests and long-term trend assessments to make sure that during the "big" years, the assessment remains the gold standard for testing.

This sounds like a lot for our students. Can you convince me this is worth it with all our other tests? While OSSE doesn’t get individual scores, these results can help shape a lot of how OSSE views things on a local, city-wide level. Firstly, NAEP is a great benchmark for OSSE’s own assessments. OSSE knows that NAEP scores are valid and go through rigorous quality control. OSSE can use those performance metrics to compare to its own rigorous testing here in the District. OSSE can use NAEP to compare and contrast and find ways to talk about how well District students perform, and OSSE can use NAEP to make its own statewide testing better.

Moreso, NAEP can be used to guide and drive positive growth through legislation – by revealing the good and the bad when it comes to test scores, OSSE knows where it has succeeded and where it needs to improve and pay attention. NAEP was one of, if not the first assessment, to take achievement gaps seriously and prove them statistically. By acknowledging that certain populations and demographics are far behind some of their peers, we can take appropriate measures to ensure equitable success for everyone.

Lastly, NAEP is Congressionally mandated – which means that students are taking it one way or another. Everyone has to participate, which is honestly a great idea – by having the whole nation on board, OSSE can see what everyone is doing to tackle tough issues together.

The last time OSSE received its DC NAEP scores, we saw our first glimpse into a post-pandemic world for assessment and student learning. We faced some hard truths and turned that into serious optimism and action. This time, OSSE hopes to see recovery and a path forward to the best future for District kids. While just one small bucket of information, NAEP acts as a great mirror to show OSSE how it can best serve the District’s children.

OSSE’s resident NAEP specialist, who wrote this post, is happy to answer any and all questions! Please reach out to Cassidy.Schenley@dc.gov if you’ve got questions or comments, especially after our scores get released!

Data Discovery – The DC School Report Card is Live! (2024 Edition)

arrien.davison — Fri, 20 Dec 2024 14:39:24 +0000

DAR

Friday, December 20, 2024 - 9:30am

As avid readers of this blog already know, OSSE collects an enormous amount of data from our schools and local education agencies (LEAs) throughout the year. This requires a lot of collaborative work with LEAs (as covered in our Data Validation and Metric Calculation Confirmation posts) and once a year, we get to publish it for the public on the DC School Report Card.

State education agencies (SEAs) are federally required to publish report cards to inform the public; OSSE works hard to ensure that we are responsive to the needs of our community members about what we publish and how we design the website. We partnered with the State Board of Education (SBOE) to gather feedback from the public and then we got to work responding to what we heard.

To that end, we have new features this year:

Comparing up to three schools across key metrics
Deeper dive into school accountability data
Multiple pictures of school communities (when applicable)

We have some new data to share this year, as well:

Student-teacher ratios
Student-staff ratios
Referrals to law enforcement

In addition, we are excited that next year, we will be able to share:

More robust school programming data (thanks to our course collection, which you can read about here, here, here, and here.)
School climate survey data from students, school-based staff, and caregivers.

We understand and appreciate that every parent and caregiver has a different set of criteria for what is most important in a school, so we work hard that the user experience is simple and straightforward. We build the entire website in house with our Chief Information ��ѻ��ýr (CIO) colleagues, which is a huge undertaking. We also make all of the data available as Excel files. We counted 1,403,735 cells of data between the twelve of them. A veritable feast of data!

You can always send feedback about the DC School Report Card to dcschoolreportcard@dc.gov. We hope you enjoy the site!

Exploring Types of Courses on 2024-25 School Year OSSE Statewide Catalog Data

arrien.davison — Thu, 19 Dec 2024 14:59:18 +0000

DAR

Thursday, December 19, 2024 - 9:45am

OSSE collects new data to broaden our understanding of the student experience. Collecting course data for the first time is telling us the courses that schools are offering as well as who is teaching and who is enrolled. We has expanded the second year of our statewide course data collection, with continued commitment and collaboration from the local education agencies (LEAs) and state public agencies (SPAs, which are part of the Department of Youth Rehabilitation Services [DYRS] and Department of Corrections [DOC] Jail Education Program). As discussed in previous data blogs on statewide course data, the primary goals of this data collection process include but are not limited to:

Collect and share actionable course data that will strengthen the ESSA State Plan Accountability System;
Improve OSSE’s ability to better perform its core compliance and monitoring functions;
Streamline the data collection process and lessen course burdens on LEAs and SPAs in the long term; and
Provide professional support to LEAs and SPAs and their staff based on course offerings

This blog introduces course data that OSSE began collecting last school year and intends to provide an overview of different types of courses in the 2024-25 School Year OSSE State Course Data. This year’s catalog data will be linked with teacher/section- and student-level course data OSSE is collecting from LEAs and SPAs via Automated Data Transfer (ADT) 2.0.

Subject Areas

Figure 1

*Miscellaneous (Misc.) Course Subject Area — SCED Framework/Classification System categorizes any courses that cannot be assigned to any of the other Course Subject Areas as courses with a miscellaneous Course Subject Area. Miscellaneous courses often include activities or skills that are applicable to a range of topics, such as Standardized Test Preparation (22001), Career Exploration (22151), or Employability Skills (22152).
**Non-Subject-Specific is used only at the prior-to-secondary level. The Non-Subject-Specific Subject Area was designed specifically for courses conveying prior-to-secondary-level content.

Figure 1 above shows the number of courses LEAs and SPAs submitted for top 10 subject areas. The change in total number of courses is a result of one less LEA in the District as well as better data quality this year, given some LEAs have consolidated some courses and removed duplicates in the submission this year. The course subject rankings remain consistent year-over-year for the top 10 but varied slightly for subjects that ranked below 10 and do not appear on Figure 1. For example, more communications and audio/visual technology and health care sciences courses were reported for the 2024-25 school year, and fewer hospitality and tourism courses were reported this year.

Data from the 2023-24 school year told OSSE that there were the greatest number of Arts, English Language Arts (ELA), and Math courses among DC schools, and this year’s data, along with Student and Section Course Data OSSE is collecting for the first time, will help OSSE paint a more detailed picture on actual enrollment trends.

Course Level

Table 1 below lists different types of course levels and the number of course submissions for each Course Level. While more than 90 percent of all submitted courses (n=14,004) were categorized as General courses, DC LEAs and SPAs reported 441 Enriched or Advanced courses, 408 Honors courses, and 160 College-Level courses. DC LEAs also reported 420 Basic or Remedial courses to meet the needs of diverse learners. LEAs and SPAs submitted the least number of College Level (C) courses, as these are designed to be credit bearing at a postsecondary institution, including Dual Enrollment courses. Table 1 provides the definitions of each course level, and Table 2 lists the number of LEAs and SPAs that submitted each of these six course levels.

Table 1

Table 2

World Languages

In DC, 43 LEAs and SPAs submitted at least one World Language course. There are 84 unique World Languages courses, and 1,102 total courses were submitted in the following languages (Table 2). “Spanish for Young Learners (prior-to-secondary),” particularly, was submitted 329 times, by 18 LEAs, which accounts for 30 percent of the total World Language courses.

Table 3

*Four general course offerings reported in the 2024-25 school year are introduction to world languages and cultures course.

Although not all of these World Languages course were Dual Language or Language Immersion courses, the course offerings listed in Table 2 above do not exactly reflect all of the translation languages required by DC Language Access Act (Amharic, Chinese, French, Korean, Spanish, Vietnamese) or the most common languages (Spanish, American Sign Language, Amharic, French, Arabic, and Mandarin) DC residents utilize. For example, even though DC is known to traditionally have a large Ethiopian immigrant population, Amharic is not largely taught in DC schools.

Advanced Placement (AP) / International Baccalaureate (IB) Courses

AP Courses

Thirty-five schools of 17 LEAs offer 403 AP courses across DC, an increase from 373 in the 2023-24 school year (Table 4). Of 35 schools that offer AP courses, 27 schools offer five or more AP courses, and 8 schools offer fewer than five AP courses. Overall, there has been a slight increase in the number of schools reporting that they offer AP courses.

Table 4

IB Courses

Five LEAs offer 209 International Baccalaureate (IB) courses across nine subject areas shown below (Figure 2). The steep change of nine to 42 for Non-subject Specific IB courses was due to the way IB Primary Years Program courses were reported from an LEA this year and is not considered a data error. Table 4 ranks the number of course offerings. DC LEAs offer 38 unique IB courses across DC. Among 38 unique IB courses, eight IB courses accounted for half of all IB course offerings. Four LEAs offered IB Primary Years program, and nearly two thirds of the IB course offerings were for high school students.

Figure 2

Table 5

*Table 5 only lists 11 courses with more than five course offerings using the specific OSSE Course Code. It omits IB courses with fewer than five course offerings.

Future blog posts will discuss dual enrollment, Montessori, career and technical education (CTE), and other special courses related to our course characteristics on the Course Catalog Collection template located on the Course Data Collection website.

OSSE will also explore with community and LEA stakeholders, the best way for OSSE to share these data in a meaningful and actionable way. In addition to the Course Catalog data collection, OSSE will soon have a more accurate understanding of course offerings and course taking patterns once Student and Section Course Data Collection comes to fruition. These data will empower OSSE to support all learners in DC, especially those furthest from opportunity, by ensuring that they have equal access to appropriate and high-quality coursework and learning environments.

Learn More
For more information about the 2024-25 school year course data collection, please see OSSE’s Course Data Collection website, where there is a copy of the 2024-25 School Year LEA Course Data Collection Policy Guide and the OSSE State Course Catalog V3.

So, what does “alternative” mean?

arrien.davison — Mon, 16 Dec 2024 14:40:11 +0000

DAR

Monday, December 16, 2024 - 9:30am

DC offers students who may struggle to thrive in traditional academic settings alternative pathways to success. DC defines alternative schools and programs in several key pieces of legislation, which can create confusion. So, as DC updates its alternative accountability framework, we’d like to clarify exactly what this means. If you want to skip the legal background, scroll down to the section titled: ‘So, why does this matter?’

There are two ways that the Division of Data, Assessment, and Research uses “alternative” to label categories of schools or programs. We do this because DC has to recognize a local definition and a federal definition.

1. Alternative for accountability – is difficult to find in the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), but the key term to search is “Annual Meaningful Differentiation” (Elementary and Secondary Education Act section 1111(c)(4)(C)). This is the term we use to find “alternative accountability” in ESSA state plans because it is in the section heading that allows states to give some schools special consideration in their accountability systems.

DC’s 2022 ESSA state plan amendment states the following to describe the ��ѻ��ý of the State Superintendent of Education’s (OSSE) alternative methodology for annual meaningful differentiation:

“For those schools for which an accountability determination based on the system of annual meaningful differentiation cannot appropriately be made based on the implementation of the statewide system (because of grade configuration, student population, or another factor), OSSE may develop an alternative methodology which will ensure meaningful differentiation and will allow the ability to identify such schools for Comprehensive Support or Targeted Support as applicable.”

It is also important to note that in earlier ESSA State Plan work, OSSE published more specific guidance noting that, “Approved definitions will be valid for a time period of three years (beginning with the accountability system published in December 2018.... OSSE reserves the right to reevaluate the alternative criteria and definition as necessary to ensure meaningful differentiation.” Schools designated as alternative for accountability purposes for the 2019-20 school year, remain designated as alternative for accountability due to waivers and extensions related to the COVID-19 public health emergency.

Table 1. Schools with Approved Alternative Accountability Designation (School Name and LEA Name)

Ballou STAY High School (DCPS)
Luke C. Moore High School (DCPS)
Roosevelt STAY High School (DCPS)
The Children's Guild DC PCS (The Children's Guild DC Public Charter School)
Goodwill Excel Center PCS (Goodwill Excel Center PCS)
Kingsman Academy PCS (Kingsman Academy PCS)
Maya Angelous PCS - High School (Maya Angelou PCS)
Maya Angelou PCS - Academy at DC Jail (Maya Angelou PCS)
Monument Academy PCS (Monument Academy PCS)

2. Alternative for funding – local per pupil funding is defined in DC Code § 38–2901 and allows for schools to get an additional amount of funding for students in approved alternative schools/programs. Specifically, alternative programs are defined as:

“(1B) “Alternative program” means specialized instruction for students under court supervision or who have a history of being on short- or long-term suspension or who have been expelled from school, or who meet other criteria as defined by the State Education ��ѻ��ý through rulemaking. To qualify as an alternative program, a school must meet the criteria and rules set by the State Education ��ѻ��ý. An alternative program may describe an entire school or a specialized program within a school.”

The alternative per pupil amount and weight may change annually according to the approved DC budget (please see this page for 2024-25 weights and amounts). LEAs may apply for this designation using a process outlined here by OSSE. Currently, the schools and programs in Table 2 have been approved (through the 2025-26 school year).

Table 2. Schools/Programs with Approved Alternative Funding Designation (per pupil)

LEA Name	School Name	Setting	New or Renewal
DCPS	Ballou STAY High School	School	Renew
Kingsman Academy PCS	Kingsman Academy PCS	School	Renew
Latin American Youth Center (LAYC) PCS	LAYC Career Academy PCS	Program	Renew
DCPS	Luke C. Moore High School	School	Renew
Maya Angelou PCS (State Public Agency, or SPA)	Maya Angelou PCS - Academy at DC Jail	School	New
Maya Angelou PCS	Maya Angelou PCS - High School	School	Renew
Maya Angelou PCS	Maya Angelou PCS - Young Adult Learning Center	School	Renew
DCPS	Roosevelt STAY High School	School	Renew
The Next Step PCS	The Next Step El Proximo Paso PCS	School	Renew
YouthBuild PCS	YouthBuild PCS	School	Renew

It is important to note that juvenile justice facilities and settings have been managed by several entities and have changed names over time. The Department of Youth Rehabilitative Services (DYRS) opened the Youth Services Center (YSC), a short-term residential detention center, in 2004. While the DYRS education programs have not changed over time, the DC Jail education program has. Currently, under a settlement agreement, the Maya Angelou Public Charter School (and See Forever Foundation) manages schools at three correctional facilities -

Maya Angelou Academy at New Beginnings
Maya Angelou Academy at DC Jail
Maya Angelou Academy at Youth Services Center

Prior to that, DCPS ran the Inspiring Youth Program (IYP) inside the jail (IYP serves students detained in the Central Detention Facility and the Correctional Treatment Facility) to meet the special education needs of incarcerated students.

Further, IYP, YSC, and Washington Metropolitan High School (Washington Met) have been designated for alternative funding in the past, but no longer receive those funds. Washington Met closed at the end of the 2019-20 school year.

So, why does this matter?

The main reason the same entities are not in each list is that the intent of these two definitions is different – the funding formula acknowledges that alternative schools work under different models that assume different costs for students in alternative programs – and operating costs for their providers. These include alternative (not full day) instructional schedules and seat time arrangements.

While alternative for accountability recognizes that alternative schools may not see meaningful differentiation on accountability metrics, so these metrics are not included in metric scores or public reporting.

So, clearly, there is some overlap between the entities included in alternative for funding and alternative for accountability groups. For example, the funding definition allows for programs inside of schools to receive alternative funding per pupil, while the ESSA definition requires whole-school designations. So LAYC can have a program qualified for alternative funding, but not be alternative for accountability.

Other designations that are easily mixed up with either alternative definition are adult schools, opportunity academies, adult serving community-based organizations, and juvenile justice and special education settings and locations. Many of these entities may receive several labels and these entities may or may not receive per pupil funding and or grants to operate their programs. We’ve illustrated these labels by entity in the table below. (Note: OSSE recently introduced the term state public agency (SPA), and school names change over time. These are other examples of how these entities may have different designations and labels each year.)

Table 3. Classifications by School/Program in the 2022-23 School Year.

Click here to view a PDF of the table.

*Please note that Roosevelt STAY HS’s name was changed by DCPS for the 2024-25 school year to Garnett-Patterson STAY HS.

Learn More
OSSE has created several blog posts about accountability such as those on floors and targets and on calculating growth. The DC School Report Card Resource Library, specifically each year’s technical guide is also a great way to learn more about the details behind this work.

Reimagining Accountability for Alternative Schools: What’s on the horizon?

arrien.davison — Thu, 31 Oct 2024 17:29:38 +0000

DAR

Tuesday, October 1, 2024 - 1:15pm

The ��ѻ��ý of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE) is required by federal law to measure school performance using an accountability system that is approved by the US Department of Education (USED) (you can read about how we measure performance for traditional schools in this blog post). OSSE has taken significant steps to revamp its accountability system for alternative schools by December 2025. The updates to the alternative accountability system aim to balance fairness with practicality, ensuring that the unique populations and missions of the District’s alternative schools are recognized and supported.

In this post, we are sharing a closer look at what this means and how it will impact alternative education in the District.

Why Change?

OSSE has not calculated accountability scores for alternative schools since before the pandemic due to various waivers that we submitted to and approved by USED. We know that alternative schools serve students who face significant challenges such as homelessness, court supervision, or previous school expulsions. Therefore, OSSE is updating the accountability system to better reflect the goals and needs of alternative schools.

Exploring Options

The Division of Data, Assessment, and Research (DAR) has explored various options to update the alternative accountability system. As part of the process of deciding what updates should be made to the system, DAR engaged in extensive research and analysis of state accountability plans across the US and engaged with a variety of local stakeholders and school leaders on alternative accountability.

Here’s a brief overview of the potential paths that DAR considered:

No Changes: Maintain the current system without updates.
Reallocate Point Values: Keep existing metrics but adjust how points are distributed.
Redefine Business Rules: Modify how existing metrics are calculated.
Add New Metrics: Introduce new metrics while keeping some existing ones.
Comprehensive Overhaul: Remove some existing metrics, add new ones, and reallocate point values.

What’s Changing?

After thorough research and consultation, OSSE’s decided to move forward with the comprehensive overhaul of Option 5 to remove existing metrics, add new ones, and reallocate point values. This approach is designed to better align the alternative accountability system with the specific needs of alternative schools.

Here’s what the proposed changes include:

Replacing the Re-engagement Metric: The current re-engagement metric, which tracks the reintegration of previously disengaged students, will be replaced with an Academic Persistence metric. This new metric focuses on keeping students engaged in their education proactively rather than reacting to disengagement.
Attendance Metrics Overhaul: Instead of relying on a single “best of” attendance metric, the new system will include both Chronic Absenteeism and Attendance Growth. This change aims to address long-term attendance issues while also recognizing improvements and aligns with attendance goals in the District.
Increasing Total Points: The total possible points will increase to 100, aligning the alternative accountability system more closely with the traditional school accountability measures.

Breakdown of Metrics

Here’s a snapshot of the proposed metrics for different framework levels:

Moving Forward

The updated alternative accountability system will be implemented by December 2025, with changes based on SY24-25 data. This timeline provides time for LEAs and schools to adapt to the new system before it impacts the next round of school improvement designations in 2027. See more about designations here.

DAR would like to express appreciation for those who participated in the four engagement sessions. As part of the work towards these enhancements, the feedback from the alternative school leaders and stakeholders has been invaluable.

What’s Next?

We are happy to share this explainer that you can print out or share online. We have an FAQ document, as well. We will also update the Technical Guide accordingly for the 2025 DC School Report Card. These updates will ensure that the alternative accountability system more accurately reflects the goals and realities of alternative schools, fostering a more supportive environment for all students.

Stay tuned for more updates as we move closer to implementing these important changes.

Metric Calculation Confirmation (MCC): Getting the Metrics and Information Right

arrien.davison — Fri, 28 Jun 2024 15:14:18 +0000

DAR

Friday, June 21, 2024 - 11:00am

When you open a DC School Report Card page, you may wonder, “where does OSSE get all of this information?” It is a lot of information – some of the underlying data files have millions of cells of data. Before OSSE publishes anything, every piece of information for every school has been reviewed and certified as accurate by its local education agency (LEA), ranging from the photo of the school to complex metrics like academic growth and accountability scores. As we first started talking about in our Data Validation post, collecting, confirming and publishing data is a year-round process that is divided into three distinct efforts:

The Annual Enrollment Audit & Child Count
Data Validation
Metric Calculation Confirmation (MCC)

Data Validation is when OSSE works with LEAs to certify the accuracy of education data. MCC uses those certified data to laser focus on what we publish on the DC School Report Card. For example, during Data Validation, LEAs confirm the accuracy of their students’ individual statewide assessment scores (now known as DC CAPE). During MCC, LEAs check to make sure those scores add up to accurate median growth percentile and growth to proficiency.

The MCC process is straightforward. It is basically an LEA-specific look under the hood of the DC School Report Card prior to publication. LEAs have time to review, ask questions, and make some changes to school information. For example, if a school has a new principal or WMATA bus route, LEAs can change those during MCC. They also have time to check our arithmetic, ask questions, and raise concerns about every piece of data or information we publish. OSSE and LEAs use the DC School Report Card Technical Guide to get on the same page and resolve any issues. MCC begins in the summer and wraps up in the fall so we can publish the DC School Report Card by December.

Of course, some things do change throughout the school year, so OSSE does allow LEAs to update fields like the principal name on a quarterly basis. We want the DC School Report Card to be as easy to understand and access as possible. MCC helps us to get there so that residents can have the confidence to dig into the data and learn more about our schools and LEAs. We are grateful for the great work from our LEAs because we could not publish the DC School Report Card with any confidence without their care and attention.

If you want to learn more about MCC, you can find the MCC Policy here. You can also find our DC School Report Card Technical Guide, which has been trimmed over time to a tidy 100 pages. It’s a page turner! Of course, the DC School Report Card is available at schoolreportcard.dc.gov.

Data Validation: Getting the Data Details Right

arrien.davison — Fri, 28 Jun 2024 14:50:55 +0000

DAR

Wednesday, June 19, 2024 - 12:00pm

One of the questions we hear is “how do we know OSSE data is accurate?” The quick answer is that OSSE does not publish anything without confirming its accuracy. Collecting, confirming and publishing data is a year-round process that is divided into three distinct efforts:

The Annual Enrollment Audit & Child Count
Data Validation
Metric Calculation Confirmation (MCC)

Data Validation is the process OSSE uses to work with local education agency (LEA) data managers to review, resolve and confirm the accuracy of student and teacher data for every public school in the District. As DC’s education data collection and reporting hub, OSSE collects data several different ways ranging from a daily student attendance feed to once-annual statewide assessment results. LEAs use a variety of different student information systems (SIS) to collect, store and share their own data with OSSE, so OSSE consolidates these data into a centralized, secure and accessible platform for LEAs to work.

At the opening of the Data Validation window, OSSE sends tables and visualizations to each LEA. LEAs have a few weeks to review everything and, if they see something wrong or have a question, they can ask OSSE for help to fix the problem. At the end of that support window, LEA Heads of School officially sign off and certify the accuracy of their data, giving OSSE permission to proceed with publication. These data are then considered authoritative.

To narrow the focus on the most important issues, OSSE runs a number of data checks to catch and flag potential errors and inconsistencies. Some examples of issues that we resolve during Data Validation are:

Missing attendance codes (i.e., the reason why a student was absent)
Errors in economically disadvantaged designations for students
Discrepancies in student information such as English learner status

As you can probably tell, this process gets down to the nitty gritty. OSSE and LEA data managers spend a lot of time and care talking about individual students to make sure that they are accurately represented in our data. OSSE appreciates all of the hard work from our LEAs to make it happen every year!

If this post made you want to learn more, we have more for you to read! OSSE’s full Data Validation Policy and other supporting documents are available on our website.

How We Measure and Study Graduation Rates in the District

arrien.davison — Mon, 13 May 2024 14:59:48 +0000

DAR

Monday, May 13, 2024 - 10:00am

OSSE reports both four-year and five-year adjusted cohort graduation rates (ACGR) for public schools in the District, in accordance with US Department of Education guidelines. We calculate these two rates by taking the number of students who graduate with a regular high school diploma in either four or five years and divide by the number of students who form the adjusted cohort for the graduating class.

Understanding the ACGR
Calculating the ACGR may sound easy, but the word adjusted adds a little complexity. Students who are entering ninth grade for the first time form a cohort, which is then adjusted by adding any students who transfer into the cohort later during the next three (or four) years and subtracting any students who transfer out, emigrate to another country, or are deceased during that same period. For example, if a student enrolls in a public school in the District in 10th grade and graduates after 12th grade, we count them. Conversely, if a student enrolls in a diploma-granting school in 11th grade for the 2021-22 school year through an official exchange program and the student or their parent/legal guardian provide evidence that the exchange program has been completed following that year, the student is removed from the 2019-20 first ninth-grade year cohort. Adjusting the cohort is important so that we accurately capture all potential graduates for reporting purposes, but tracking students over time does make calculating the ACGR very complicated.

Recent Findings
For the last four years, graduation rates have been rising in the District (see Figure 1).

Specifically, the four-year ACGR for the 2022-23 school year increased by a little more than 1-percentage point over the previous school year, with 76.1 percent of students in the District graduating high school in four years. The five-year graduation rate for the 2022-23 school year is 78.5 percent, which is also a little more than a 1-percentage-point increase.

Figure 1. Multi-Year District of Columbia Statewide Four-Year Adjusted Cohort Graduation Rate

Since OSSE began using ACGR in the 2010-11 school year, the graduation rate for the District has increased by more than 15 percentage points (see Table 1).

Table 1. Multi-Year District of Columbia Statewide 4-Year Adjusted Cohort Graduation Rate

2011-2012	61.0%
2012-2013	61.5%
2013-2014	65.4%
2014-2015	69.2%
2016-2017	72.4%
2017-2018	68.5%
2018-2019	68.2%
2019-2020	70.9%
2020-2021	72.6%
2021-2022	74.9%
2022-2023	76.1%

In addition to calculating rates for District students overall, we also look at rates for students served by DC Public Schools (DCPS) and students served by public charter schools (see Table 2). The four-year graduation rate for DCPS) is 75.3 percent, an increase of 2.8 percentage points from the previous year. The five-year graduation rate is 75.5 percent, an increase of 0.6 percentage points. The four-year graduation rate for public charter schools is 79.4 percent, a slight decrease of 0.7 percentage points from the previous year. The five-year graduation rate is 84.4 percent, an increase of 2.4 percentage points.

Table 2. ACGR Rates Across Sectors

	4-Year ACGR	5-Year ACGR
Statewide	76.1%	78.5%
DCPS	75.3%	75.5%
PCS	79.4%	84.4%

OSSE also reports graduation rates for various student groups. We have seen increases in graduation rates for most student groups for both the four-year and five-year graduation rates (see Tables 3, 4, and 5).

Table 3. ACGR Rates Across Race/Ethnicity

Race/Ethnicity	4-Year AGCR	4-Year AGCR	5-Year AGCR	5-Year AGCR
	SY21-22	SY22-23	SY21-22	SY22-23
American Indian/Alaskan Native	n<10	n<10	>90.0%	n<10
Asian	94.5%	92.9%	91.2%	94.5%
Black/African American	73.6%	74.3%	75.5%	78%
Hispanic/Latino of Any Race	68.4%	70.3%	74.7%	70.4%
Native Hawaiian/Other Pacific Islander	n<10	n<10	n<10	n<10
Two or More Races	87.5%	93.4%	92.9%	93.5%
White	95.3%	97.6%	93.0%	96.3%

Table 4. ACGR Rates Across Support Status

Support Status	4-Year ACGR	4-Year ACGR	5-Year ACGR	5-Year ACGR
	SY21-22	SY22-23	SY21-22	SY22-23
At-Risk Students	63.2%	-	68.6%	-
Overage Students	-	42.4%	-	48.9%
Economically Disadvantaged Students	-	68.4%	-	71.2%
English Learners	54.3%	58.0%	66.6%	58.0%
Students with Disabilities	58.1%	62.4%	64.6%	65.1%

Table 5. ACGR Rates Across Gender Identity

Gender Identity	4-Year ACGR	4-Year ACGR	5-Year ACGR	5-Year ACGR
	SY21-22	SY22-23	SY21-22	SY22-23
Male	81.0%	82.2%	82.0%	84.0%
Female	68.8%	70.0%	72.6%	73.0%

One important note is that some student groups are small. As part of OSSE’s Student Privacy and Data Suppression Policy, we do not report on student groups below the minimum n-size of 10 students. As such, some subtotals may not sum to the total number of students because these student groups are not reported in these data. We’ve also included some new student groups (economically disadvantaged, overage) this year that weren’t reflected in previous years, and discontinued reporting on the at-risk student group since that information is encompassed in the new groups.

If you want to take a deep dive into our graduation data, please check out the public files. We share all public data in Excel files so you can easily explore the data or import it into a data visualization application.

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to OSSE’s Administrative Data

arrien.davison — Thu, 09 May 2024 13:39:39 +0000

DAR

Thursday, May 9, 2024 - 9:15am

“The reason why it was published in the form of a micro sub meson electronic component [webpage] is that if it were printed in normal book form, an interstellar hitchhiker would require several inconveniently large buildings to carry it around in.” ~ Douglas Adams

Did you know that in addition to the DC School Report Card, OSSE publishes many administrative data sets for public use each year? And that the division of Data, Assessment, and Research (DAR) works with OSSE’s program divisions and CIO’s office to fulfil hundreds of unique data requests in addition to completing required reporting? We do!

You can navigate to the Data & Reports page from the OSSE homepage – osse.dc.gov – using the Topics → Data & Reports dropdown menu. Suppressed versions of these responses and data files live online for public use. We’d like to give you a tour!

Quick Stats at the top of the Data and Reports page give it to you straight. If you want to know how many schools, students, or what percentage of students represent a particular group across DC, this is a great place to start. As a bonus, most information is updated each school year.

You can also browse down the Data and Reports page to access detailed information by topic including Assessments, Attendance, Discipline & Mobility, DC School Report Card & STAR Framework, Early Learning, Enrollment, HS Graduation & Postsecondary Readiness, School Health & Wellness, and Special Populations. At the bottom of the page, OSSE shares prior year oversight and budget responses so that you can review the information OSSE shares with DC Council.

Let’s dive in!
Many links on this page direct you to downloadable Excel workbooks that offer point-in-time snapshots of analyses at the state, local education agency (LEA), or school level. You can use these workbooks to answer questions about a school in your neighborhood or to compare between schools or LEAs.

There are also reports with charts and recommendations, too, so that you can learn more about trends and hot takes on specific topics like attendance. For example, OSSE shares both the 2023-24 Mid-Year Attendance Brief and the 2022-23 report and data under the Attendance Report section.

But wait, there’s more! Many recurring datapoints are available in annual files back to the 2016-17 school year. For example, OSSE’s early learning and enrollment audit annual reports and data are produced by DAR with CIO the ��ѻ��ý of Enrollment & Residency, and the Division of Early Learning to inform our community about how many learners are participating in public education in DC annually.

We recognize that these data are static, meaning not real-time. However, in the spirit of balancing transparency and protecting student and educator privacy, the administrative data we can share are published for your use – parents to councilmembers.

And OSSE’s data modernization efforts are a part of our Strategic Plan Priority to Reimagine Systems. As we make progress on that priority our data infrastructure changes will improve data quality, help us all measure the impact of everyone’s time and resources, and inform future planning. We are also looking forward to creating more dynamic data visualizations.

For now, chances are, if you have a question about an education topic, and OSSE collects the data, there will be a data set for you on the Data and Reports page. We hope you’ll check it out!

Learn More
You can always access the Data and Reports page at osse.dc.gov/page/data-and-reports-0 or navigate to it under the Topics dropdown menu in the ��ѻ��ýpage navigation bar.

Exploring Literacy Curriculums Using 2023-24 School Year OSSE Statewide Course Data

arrien.davison — Mon, 04 Mar 2024 18:40:13 +0000

DAR

Monday, March 4, 2024 - 1:30pm

As we discussed in previous data blogs, the ��ѻ��ý of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE) is in the first year of collecting course data and has received data about 16,487 courses from all 72 local education agencies (LEAs) in the District. To keep everything clear, organized and consistent, each course has a corresponding code. For example, to examine English courses, we simply pull the list of courses that start with “01.” In this blog, we are going to focus on literacy curriculum.

OSSE is interested in literacy curriculum because our Division of Teaching and Learning develops professional development and resources to support literacy work for all LEAs. While providing literacy curriculum information was optional for LEAs, we received 278 courses that included curriculum information from 33 schools at 23 LEAs. In total, we received information about 2,473 English courses and literacy curriculum information from 206 of these courses (8 percent). (This includes one non-English course, as an LEA provided literacy curriculum information associated with the course.) Although we do not report findings on the other 72 courses in this blog post, we plan on expanding and discussing curriculum information on other course subjects. The collection of literacy curriculum supports the recommendations from the Literacy Task Force (LTF) which establishes LEAs to provide high-quality instructional materials. Per recent legislation about dyslexia, LEAs are required to adopt a science-based reading curriculum for the 2024-25 school year. This course collection hopes to provide a valuable data point to establish relevant and aligned resources for LEAs.

What are the most popular literacy curricula?

OSSE put together a list of widely used literacy curricula for LEAs to select from. Table 1 below shows the frequency of the curriculums used in 81 English courses that use curriculum from the option set presented to LEAs. OSSE will use this data to refine the list of curricula in future collections.

Table 1

Of the 206 English courses (including one other non-English course), “Any Other Literacy Curriculum” was used 124 times. In Table 2 below, LEAs provided the following 24 curricula:

Table 2

Did we receive any curriculum information about non-English courses?

Six LEAs provided literacy curriculum for 74 courses that aren’t considered English courses in the OSSE State Course Catalog (courses that have an OSSE Course Code that doesn’t start with “01”). We highlight these so that LEAs may consider sharing more about curriculums for other topics in the future.

Table 3:

LEA	Non-English Curriculum Information Submitted
LEA 1 & 2	Each of these LEAs submitted one course with OSSE Course Code 02079 (Geometry—Other) that uses “Montessori Language.”
LEA 3	They submitted eight courses with OSSE Course Code 04302 (Humanities). Four of the courses are each offered to a single grade span, grades 5-8. These four courses use EL Education. The remaining four courses are each offered to a single grade span, grades 5-8, and marked as being for English learners (ELs). These four courses use EL Education and Styer-Fitzgerald.
LEA 4	They submitted 30 courses with the following course titles, once each for grades Early Childhood, Pre-Kindergarten, Kindergarten, Grade 1, and Grade 2: Mathematics: Mother Goose Time (pre-K 3), Three Cheers for PK (pre-K 4), and Envision Math Science: Mother Goose Time (pre-K 3), Three Cheers for PK (pre-K 4), and Paige & Paxton Physical and Health Education: SPARK Spanish for Young Learners: Spanish for Kids Music: Quaver Ed Art: Art Book Activity Bundle (Teachers Pay Teachers)
LEA 5	All 38 courses submitted use “LEA created curriculum,” including 33 non-English courses.
LEA 6	They are the only LEA that submitted a non-English course with information from the Literacy Curriculum option set, OSSE Course Code 05165 (Crafts), which uses the “Creative Curriculum.”

We also looked at LEAs that did not report literacy curriculum to see what we could learn. Some appear to use curricula from our option set based on their course descriptions. For example, some LEAs include Amplify Curriculum or Wilson Reading in their LEA Course Description for English Courses, but they did not report literacy curriculum information this year. We plan on attempting to improve the response rate on this element via more deliberate training and communication with LEAs.

It is important to note that OSSE does not collect information about the number of students enrolled in a course yet, making it harder to put these numbers into context. Smaller LEAs could have reported more information than larger LEAs at this stage. We don’t have enough context to understand why certain LEAs chose not to report literacy curriculum and if there are significant differences between these LEAs and the ones that did report. However, we hope this blog shows some of the potential of what course data collection can achieve. Phase 2 of the course data collection, which we plan on launching in the 2024-25 school year, will help paint a larger picture around literacy curriculum in addition to other areas we discussed in previous blog posts on course data. As our course data collection evolves and provides data on additional content areas, those additional data sets will continue to inform the need for curricular support across LEAs.

Learn More
For more information about the 2023-24 school year course data collection, please see OSSE’s website, where there is a copy of the 2023-24 School Year LEA Course Data Collection Policy Guide and the OSSE State Course Catalog.

Exploring Types of Courses on 2023-24 School Year OSSE Statewide Course Data

arrien.davison — Mon, 12 Feb 2024 14:44:40 +0000

DAR

Monday, February 12, 2024 - 9:15am

For the first time, the ��ѻ��ý of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE) officially launched a statewide course data collection in the 2023-24 school year. As discussed in a previous data blog on statewide course data, the primary goals of this data collection process include but are not limited to:

Collect and share actionable course data that will strengthen the School Accountability System;
Provide OSSE, local education agencies (LEAs) and community and external stakeholders opportunities to contribute to increasing opportunities for the District’s diverse learners;
Streamlining the data collection process and lessen burdens on LEAs in the long term; and
Provide professional support to LEAs and their staff based on course offerings.

While the previous data blog Understanding OSSE State Course Catalog provides an introduction to the course data OSSE began collecting this school year, this current data blog intends to provide an overview of different types of courses on 2023-24 School Year OSSE State Course Data.

Subject Areas

Figure One

Figure 1 above shows the number of courses LEAs submitted by subject areas. Top 10 of the ranks by the number of course offerings were included in the figure above, and 12 subject areas in the bottom ranks were excluded from the figure for readability.

Because Phase 1 of the course data collection process did not collect information on the number of sections per course, it would be presumptuous to claim Arts, English Language Arts (ELA), and Math courses were the most “popular” among DC schools. We can, however, claim that there was most degree of diversity in course offerings in Arts, ELA, and Math courses because 2,853 different art courses, 2,474 different ELA courses, and 2,280 different math courses were reported by DC LEAs. Each of these courses may have one section (or class period) or ten sections, so Phase 1 of our course data collection does not yet determine which courses are more subscribed than others.

Course Level

Table 1 below lists different types of Course Levels and the number of course submissions for each Course Level. While more than 90 percent of all submitted courses (14,900) were categorized as General courses, DC LEAs reported 407 Enriched or Advanced courses, 400 Honors courses, and 157 College-Level courses. DC LEAs also reported 416 Basic or Remedial courses to meet the needs of diverse learners. LEAs submitted the least number of College Level (C) courses, as these are designed to be credit-bearing at a postsecondary institution, including Dual Enrollment courses. Most LEAs submitted Advanced Placement (AP) and International Baccalaureate (IB) courses as Enriched (E) courses. The number of LEAs that submitted each of these six Course Levels is listed in Table 1 below.

Table 1

Course Level	Number of Course Submissions	Number of Unique LEAs
Basic or Remedial (B)	416	22
College Level (C)	157	8
Enriched (E)	407	11
General (G)	14,900	64
Honors (H)	400	15
No Specified Level of Rigor (X)	207	15

World Languages

In the District, 44 LEAs submitted at least one World Language course. There are 82 unique World Languages courses, and 1,098 total courses were submitted in the following languages (Table 2). “Spanish for Young Learners (prior-to-secondary),” particularly, was submitted 345 times, by 18 LEAs, which accounts for 31 percent of the total World Language courses.

Table 2

Language	Number of Unique Courses	Total Number of Courses
Spanish	18	705
French	15	159
Chinese	15	116
Latin	9	51
Arabic	6	15
Italian	4	15
American Sign Language	5	11
Hebrew	1	6
Greek	3	3
Japenese	2	2

Although not all of these World Languages course were Dual Language or Language Immersion courses, the course offerings listed in the Table 2 above do not exactly reflect the top languages (Spanish, Amharic, French, Chinese, and Russian) DC students speak. For example, even though DC is known to traditionally have a large Ethiopian immigrant population, Amharic is not largely taught in District schools.

Advanced Placement (AP) / International Baccalaureate (IB) Courses

AP Courses

Thirty-five schools of 17 LEAs offer 373 AP courses across the District (Table 3). Twenty-five schools offer more than five AP courses, and 10 schools offer five or fewer AP courses.

Table 3

Course Name	Number of Schools Offering the Course
AP English Language and Composition	33
AP English Literature and Composition	30
AP US History	24
AP World History: Modern	20
AP US Government and Politics	20
AP Psychology	20
AP Environmental Science	19
AP Computer Science Principles	18
AP Calculus AB	17
AP Biology	16
Total	373

IB Courses

Five LEAs offer 161 IB courses across nine subject areas shown below (Figure 2). Table 4 ranks the number of course offerings. DC LEAs offer 37 unique IB courses across the District. Among 37 unique IB courses, eight IB courses accounted for half of all IB course offerings. Two LEAs offered IB Primary Years program, and nearly 95 percent of the IB course offerings were for high school students.

Figure 2

Table 4

Course Name	Number of Schools Offering the Course
IB History	14
IB Mathematics: Applications and Interpretation	13
IB Visual Arts	11
IB Biology	10
IB Primary Years Program	9
IB Language B—English	9
IB Language B—Spanish	8
Total	161

In the coming year, OSSE will explore, with community and LEA stakeholders, the best way for OSSE to share this data in a meaningful and actionable way. Phase 1 of the course data collection has its limits but can still initiate and expand curiosity that Phase 2 collection will hopefully and most likely satisfy. Course Data Collection Team at OSSE looks forward to collaborating and seeking feedback from all types of stakeholders, so that we can achieve equitable outcomes for all DC students.

Understanding OSSE State Course Catalog

arrien.davison — Tue, 06 Feb 2024 14:28:48 +0000

DAR

Tuesday, February 6, 2024 - 9:15am

Are you a parent who is eager to know and compare different courses being offered across the District? Are you a local education agency (LEA) that has received transfer students from another LEA but having trouble interpreting their previous transcript or coursework?

Imagine a world where all courses are coded into a simple and standardized system, as if we are all speaking the same “language” about course data, when all AP US History are coded as “04104,” and all Honors-level courses as denoted as “H”… How much easier it will be to document, interpret, and compare course data across the District!

Good news is, we are one step closer to this goal! OSSE is excited to introduce the OSSE State Course Catalog V2_0.xlsx (live.com) in the 2023-24 school year Course Data Collection process. The OSSE State Course Catalog is developed upon the School Courses for the Exchange of Data (SCED), which is developed by the National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES).

What is SCED?

The SCED is a voluntary, common classification system for pre-kindergarten through 12th grade courses (pre-K-12). It includes elements and attributes that identify basic course information.

As noted in the Forum Guide to Understanding the School Courses for the Exchange of Data (SCED) Classification System, SCED Course Code is a “five-digit code that provides a standardized number for the general subject area and specific subject of the course: the first two digits of the code represent the Course Subject Area and the next three digits indicate the specific Course Number. SCED Course Codes are general but provide enough specificity to identify the course’s topic and distinguish it from other courses in that Course Subject Area.” The below graph illustrates how the Course Subject Area and Course Number combine to form the Course Code:

To ensure the consistency and comparability of DC’s course codes with other states, the OSSE State Course Catalog includes all SCED Course Codes from SCED V10, with a number of new course codes added to accommodate the unique Career and Technical Education (CTE) course offerings in the District.

What is an OSSE Course Identifier?

OSSE uses the SCED framework to create an OSSE Course Identifier – a unique, 12-digit code for each course collected in state reporting. There are four separate components to this code that provide context about the courses offered by an LEA:

OSSE Course Code combining Course Subject Area and Course Number
OSSE Course Level
Carnegie Units or Grade Span
Course Sequence indicating where the course lies as part of a standardized course sequence.

Examples:

Prior-to-Secondary Course (Mathematics (Grade 2)): 02032G020211

Secondary Course (Civics): 04161G1.0011

Adult Course (English as a Second Language One): 01008XAAAA14

What to expect next?

Upon collecting course-level data from all LEAs in the District and training LEAs on mapping courses to the State Course Catalog, OSSE is able to create a 12-digit OSSE Course Identifier for each course offered in the District. Those standardized course codes across the District create comparable and reliable variables as OSSE document, analyze and make informed policy decisions regarding high-quality coursework access and targeted professional development support to LEAs. LEAs can also take advantage of these standard course codes to maintain longitudinal data about students’ coursework, and efficiently exchange course-taking records.

Learn More

This data blog will introduce important factors you need to know about DC’s first statewide course data collection in 2023-24 school year.

For more information about the SCED framework and the OSSE State Course Catalog, please visit National Forum on Education Statistics - School Courses for the Exchange of Data (SCED) and the OSSE State Course Catalog V2.

Expanding Our Knowledge about Course Offerings

arrien.davison — Tue, 23 Jan 2024 15:02:29 +0000

DAR

Tuesday, January 23, 2024 - 9:45am

The ��ѻ��ý of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE) is always looking to improve the quality of data that we collect and share with the community, particularly when it can connect to other data and enhance our ability to help families make decisions. For example, we know that deciding how to rank schools in a school lottery application has broad impact and we want to ensure that each family has the information needed to make choices based on their different priorities. Because of this, we have emphasized the importance of collecting and sharing quality data by making it a priority throughout our Recovery to Restoration 2023-25 Strategic Plan.

This school year marks the beginning of District-wide course data collection. This will ultimately lead to the streamlining of existing data collections and allow OSSE to gain new insights into the ways that instruction is delivered across the District. For example, OSSE’s Division of Teaching and Learning will have access to new information that allows them to be more strategic and responsive when planning professional development.

Learning From Other States and Piloting the Process
We began this process in 2021, using funding from the Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund (ESSER) to conduct landscape analysis and study the ways that other states already collect this type of data. As a result, a decision was made to use the School Courses for the Exchange of Data (SCED) as the basis for creating OSSE’s own Course Catalog. SCED is a set of course codes, with matching course names and titles, that is developed and maintained by a National Center for Education and Statistic (NCES) working group, which is comprised of state and local education agency (LEA) representatives. Though each state can customize the catalog by adding unique course codes, this means that DC’s system is very close to what is used in other states (including Maryland and Virginia). Among other things, this will make it easier to understand the academic records of students who may transfer to DC from other states that also use SCED.

In the 2022-23 school year, OSSE piloted the data collection process with 12 volunteer LEAs; this process gave OSSE a chance to test out training materials and tweak the overall design of the internal data collection process before rolling it out to all LEAs. Building upon the landscape analysis and feedback from pilot LEAs, OSSE finalized the collection templates and updated the OSSE State Course Catalog, including adding course codes unique to the District.

The First Course Data Collection
Between June and October 2023, the OSSE Course Data Collection Team delivered two comprehensive trainings, seven-course coding workshops, three sessions of office hours and 16 individual support sessions to LEAs. As a result, OSSE collected data about 16,487 courses when each LEA in the District submitted a course catalog to OSSE. Though the course catalogs will continue to be collected annually, OSSE does not expect LEAs to need to make many changes from year to year. This data collection includes information about each credit-bearing course taught to all students enrolled in the LEA, pre-K 3 through Adult. Intervention services, before and after school programs, and other ways that schools serve students outside of time spent in academic courses is not within the scope of this collection.

LEAs assigned each course a five-digit course code from the OSSE State Course Catalog that is the best match between the OSSE and LEA course descriptions. For example, OSSE Course Code 04105 is meant for Social Sciences and History courses that cover state-specific studies. It was used for a course called “Go Go, Human Rights and Social Action.” LEAs also provided additional information about each course, such as if the course is specifically designed for English learners, if students are taking the course while dually enrolled at an institute of higher education, or which curriculums are used for literacy courses.

The chart below illustrates the subject-area distribution of the ten most commonly submitted courses:

Based on all LEA courses submitted, 17 LEAs offer a total of 373 Advanced Placement (AP) courses, five LEAs offer a total of 161 International Baccalaureate (IB) courses and students are learning 11 different foreign languages across the District, including Japanese and Arabic.

Future Years
OSSE is now in the planning stages of expanding the course data collection to include more information about who teaches and takes each course that is provided from an LEA’s course catalog. This will likely be done through a daily feed system, similar to how attendance information is currently collected from LEAs, beginning at the start of the 2024-25 school year. For example, OSSE will soon know how many sections of a certain AP course are being offered each semester—District-wide—and how many students are enrolled in these classes. We will also have more information about which courses are being taught in languages other than English, and which students with special education needs are being served by which para professionals in a given course. With this additional level of data, we will be able to conduct increased analysis to determine which students have access to which courses, what interventions are most successful, and better understand our greatest instructional strengths, gaps and needs.

Learn More
For more information about the 2023-24 course data collection, please see OSSE’s website, where there is a copy of the 2023-24 School Year LEA Course Data Collection Policy Guide and the OSSE State Course Catalog.