Only You Can Stop Data Abuse: Red Bank, NJ Edition
I freely admit that there can be different, equally valid ways of interpreting data. I am the last person to say a data analysis is always "proof" of a particular point someone wants to make. I am leery of the use of overly complicated statistical methods when simpler descriptive methods may be better.
But there is no excuse when a school "leader" misuses data to justify his or her practices and policies -- particularly when they do so at the expense of others.
I'm cynical enough to know politicians and media pundits can and will do this all the time; however, when someone in a position of authority at a school or a district or a state agency or even the USDOE abuses data to make themselves look better and others look worse, it's completely unacceptable.
We are told over and over again by those in positions of influence that we have entered an era of "data-driven instruction." Well, if that's true, a leader is just as derelict in his duty when he misuses data as he is when he misapplies educational practices within the bounds of his authority.
This particularly irks me because we are seeing more "alternative" programs like Relay Graduate School of Education or the Broad Superintendent's Academy or SUPES that appear, to me, to have little interest in developing future educational leaders as good consumers of research and data. I'm not saying university-based programs don't often - See more at: http://jerseyjazzman.blogspot.com/2016/02/only-you-can-stop-data-abuse-red-bank.html#sthash.6Nha84Vy.dpuf