School leaders are faced with the continuing challenge of effectively meeting the needs of every learner. At Western Heights Independent School District in Oklahoma, a district of six schools and 3,100 students, we've developed a model to harness emerging technologies to deliver real-time, relevant information on student performance to every teacher in every classroom.

By integrating advanced instructional and administrative software and instituting new policies, we're now able to facilitate data-driven decision making at all levels: district, site, classroom, and student. We've leveraged this integration to achieve positive changes in reporting, instructional intervention, and finance.

Here's our story...

At Western Heights, managing data became overwhelming for counselors, teachers, principals, and administration. Several IT systems existed to perform administrative functions, and consolidated reporting was performed manually. The No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) brought with it additional analysis and reporting requirements. Everyone was exasperated, trying to manually manage and report on the data, without an effective, integrated information system. Furthermore, the real-time data needed for instructional intervention was unavailable. These challenges prevented teachers from making effective, data-driven decisions, limited student instructional management to improve performance, caused inadequate and time-consuming reporting, and--we believed--cost us lost funding.

We saw in NCLB the opportunity to drive significant positive changes district-wide, which could increase our efficiencies and simultaneously improve student achievement. We embraced the task of aligning our Instructional Management System (IMS) and Student Information System (SIS) to create a foundation for multiple improvements. Our goals were to:

• Bring the best possible instruction to students;
• Identify at-risk students early, to enable corrective actions;
• Deliver to teachers critical student performance data and instructional support in real time;
• Meet and exceed the mandates of NCLB;
• Improve operational efficiencies; and
• Increase funding.

We believed that by integrating instructional and administrative applications, and by reporting on connections across these systems, we would be able to improve student performance.

A robust technological infrastructure was needed, and because the integration of data was imperative, we chose to leverage the Schools Interoperability Framework (SIF) model. Using a "best of breed" approach, we chose Microsoft's Class Server as our IMS, Chancery Student Management System (SMS) and Win School as our SIS, and Intel's Zone Integration Server (ZIS) to tie these and other systems together. The integration of our IMS (Class Server) and our SIS (Chancery) with other data-intensive systems--transportation, food service, health, and library--gave us the foundation to accomplish our goals.

Achieving integration

To achieve the integration, we upgraded to the latest versions of Chancery SMS and Microsoft Class Server. These applications are each run by two servers: a front-end application and web server, and a second, back-end database server. These SIF-compliant solutions, together with a Mizuni ZIS, allow the district to populate all relevant systems with student information automatically as soon as it is entered for the first time in our SIS. Student registration information, longitudinal student records, and student assessment data then can be matched up and delivered to the correct teacher and class quickly and easily.

Using our SIS as a single point of data entry has greatly improved the accuracy of our student information. The resulting integration and sharing of information has streamlined our processes and reduced costs. One centralized department is responsible for data entry. We also have the freedom and flexibility to add many users to the system, with assigned rights based on their roles.

Implementation and professional development were accomplished over a two-month period during our summer vacation. Four teachers were designated as district trainers and were taken out of the classroom for training on all technology programs, including Class Server and Chancery SMS. Thirty-two other teachers functioned as site trainers, providing the first level of support.

Seeing results

We are achieving the gains we'd planned in reporting, instruction, and funding. Here's a brief example for each.