School data rooms have a long tradition of displaying student assessment results on a chart within an area for staff only. Typically, they present levels of electronic reports in education proficiency (below basic or basic, proficient, or advanced) in a particular area, such as reading or math. The goal is to help teachers focus on students who are behind their peers and require more intensive interventions.

Despite the current concern about privacy of students, showing information about students in a public manner can be detrimental. If the display contains students’ names, it could lead to shame or embarrassment in struggling students. It is essential to think about the ways your school utilizes these displays, and to think about more secure alternatives.

Online platforms that store your learning data in a secure way are a great alternative to the traditional school wall of data. These platforms can pull information from LMS assignments formsative and summative tests as well as demographic data. They can even integrate with your SIS to provide reports. Teachers can access these data sets at any time in a safe dashboard. They can use a wide variety of filters to focus on specific trends or cohorts of students. They can also see live progress against goals and drill down to individual students, assignments and individual learning trends.

Regular discussions about data are essential for a data room to be meaningful. This allows teachers to focus their attention and leave with concrete steps to move students forward. If a group notices that a lot of students struggle with math, say they may decide to create an intervention to address that particular area and then monitor progress until the students have reached proficiency.