The 3 most important things that I learned in this course are (i) Setting up a data team sets the foundation for making sense of a school's data for school improvement (ii) Data tells a lot of stories if we would only look closely. (iii)As we analyze data, we must be prepared to invest time and resources in developing and implementing an Action plan.
The most valuable field experience was the elevator speech, it was a marketing effort to promote the data team initiative. As educators, we rarely consider ourselves as marketers but we need such skills to convince stakeholders that an initiative that improves instructional practice is worthwhile. It also felt as if I was running for office... This feeling was significant because it emphasized the need to convince fellow educators to believe in an initiative that they are yet to experience.
As an Instructional Technology Specialist, I plan to continue applying this learning forward by recognizing that I have a responsibility to convince teachers that technology or data initiatives are not being introduced as an additional task; rather, as a central effort to unify the common vision across various initiatives within the school. Emphasizing this central approach is key to convincing teachers to collect, analyze and apply data driven instructional practices to improve student outcome.
Every idea will always face its challenges. I particularly anticipate time constraint as the major challenge because teachers usually feel overwhelmed and don't like to hear about "additional" initiatives so to speak.