BVSD is Data-Driven: New metrics dashboard tracks districtwide strategic plan progress

En Español

The Boulder Valley School District (BVSD) is proud to launch an all new Strategic Plan Dashboard. This dashboard will show the staff and community our progress within the four key objectives of our All Together for All Students Strategic Plan. While we have access to a number of data visualizations in BVSD, this dashboard will serve as a common tool that all schools, staff and community can reference over the next five years as we set targets and celebrate improved outcomes for kids.

Some of the metrics available in the dashboard include achievement and growth scores, discipline, BVSD’s Grad Plus framework (a career or college advantage for every graduate), and climate and culture metrics. These metrics can be viewed on a districtwide scale or by individual school communities, thanks in part to a direction by the BVSD Board of Education which tasked the district with reporting and sharing the information publicly.

Data in the dashboard show annually updated metrics in line with the BVSD strategic plan “All Together for All Students.” When developing and monitoring the plan, staff also analyze more frequently updated information reported via BVSD’s various platforms from schools and staff, school surveys completed by parents, grades, state testing, BVSD departments and more.

These metrics represent progress within the strategic plan’s four key objectives:

• All students experience grade-level, standards-based instruction
• Educators and administrators implement and monitor tiered supports and instructional strategies to engage and grow all students
• Throughout their PK-12 career, all students have the opportunity to access career exploration opportunities
• All students feel valued and included in their learning environment

BVSD’s Senior Data Visualization Designer, Clare Sims oversees the strategic plan metrics dashboard and is responsible for data collection processes and visualization for the district.

“The strategic plan data dashboard is designed to primarily help staff to inform their instructional and personal approaches to student success, but also is data we’re sharing with the public to have a single source of truth to help guide our work in supporting students,” Sims shared. “The goal is to keep everyone well-informed in a way that will push the work of our strategic plan forward positively.”

Boulder Valley maintains an online data warehouse where information is collected on a server, where all school and district data is centralized. Important data includes academic reports, state-based testing, and student survey results reporting school climate and culture. 

“A lot of our work in data visualization is internal-facing, equipping teachers with the dashboards they need to best serve students by knowing what results we are or aren’t getting in our targeted areas of support,” said Sims.

“We’re committed to transparency of our data and how we’re doing as a district, with data privacy being at the forefront of our work in this area.”

The Strategic Plan dashboard is not the only available data dashboard that families can access. On the BVSD dashboard webpage, families and staff can find interactive data dashboards reporting results of school climate surveys, proportionality metrics, and sustainability.

The dashboards are layered with graphs and charts, with explanations in explaining the data sets as you hover over certain items.

Chris Brecht is BVSD’s Director of Strategic Initiatives, and works with schools and district leadership on the implementation of the strategic plan.

“For staff that need it or families or community members who are interested, dive into it, the information is there,” said Brecht. “Anyone wanting to see how we’re doing on the initiatives we’ve committed to can use this tool, to see how your school is doing, and how we’re tracking progress for our students.”

One layer of the metrics available for view in the dashboard are growth and achievement scores, established by state testing. The BVSD Board of Education also requested a climate index, available by school, which demonstrates reports from student surveys about school climate metrics like a welcoming environment, support, feelings of belonging, teacher’s care, and instances of bullying.

Brecht says he hopes parents and staff take comfort in knowing that the district is measuring the things we as a community care about and that matter to you, and most importantly that impact student success. 

“High-functioning organizations share their targets and goals and monitor their progress,” said Brecht. “You can see that we’re not setting arbitrary targets, our district strategic plan has intentional, concrete goals we’re working toward and in many cases making progress on.”

The work of the strategic plan and its initiatives around student success continues to evolve as goals are set and met, and new targets are acquired.

“Our BVSD Board of Education is deeply engaged in this work and have tasked our district with tracking this progress and sharing it with the community,” said Brecht.

“Student success is never isolated to a school district, it’s reflective of the community, parents and staff of our schools,” said Brecht. “When everyone is looking at the same targets and the same progress, it informs student success.”

Visit the BVSD data dashboard webpage to review district metrics, and visit the BVSD strategic plan webpage to learn more about our “All Together for All Students” strategic plan.