To Improve Learning For Each Learner, Turn a Mirror on Your System

New book extends the Data Wise model to the system level. May 2024
 

Looking at Data Through an Equity Lens

Educator teams need to take a more inquiry-based approach to data analysis to address inequitable norms and patterns. Systemic inequity affects the expectations for what students can achieve, the way in which they are treated in classrooms, and how they see themselves in the curriculum. February 2022

Making Meetings Work

Solutions to the common pitfalls that can sink a meeting — so educators can make the most of their collaborative time. May 2018

Collaborative Learning — With Structure

How one instructor intentionally models and fosters the key collaboration skills that students need, now and in their professional futures. January 2018

Using Data Wisely at the System Level

District-level administrators carefully analyze their own performance data, practicing what they preach to local educators. August 2017 

Eight Steps to Becoming Data Wise

Here's how school-based teams get the most out of their data-inquiry meetings. November 2015

The Path of Data Wisdom

Celebrating 10 Years, the Data Wise Project unveils a new portfolio of resources. April 2015

Gutman Book Talk: Data Wise Third Edition

Original Data Wise co-editors Dick Murnane and Liz City join Candice Bocala and Kathy Boudett for a lively discussion about the new edition of the book that came out on the 20^th Anniversary of the first publication. October 2025.

Data Wise, Revised and Expanded Edition

The Revised and Expanded Edition of Data Wise: A Step-by-Step Guide to Using Assessment Results to Improve Teaching and Learning (Harvard Education Press, 2013) shows how systematic and thoughtful examination of a wide range of data can catalyze critical school-wide dialogue. These conversations can help schools tap into teachers' knowledge, foster collaboration, identify obstacles to change, enhance school culture, and improve student learning. Also available in Portuguese.

System Wise: Continuous Instructional Improvement at Scale

System Wise: Continuous Instructional Improvement at Scale (Harvard Education Press, 2024) provides a blueprint to scale up the Data Wise process for continuous improvement, extending it from classrooms and schools to broader educational contexts.

Meeting Wise: Making the Most of Collaborative Time for Educators

Meeting Wise: Making the Most of Collaborative Time for Educators identifies improving meeting agendas as a high-leverage strategy for changing how people work together, and offers tools for developing a common language for discussing and improving the quality of meeting design and the templates to help you get started. It provides tips for setting up, facilitating, and participating effectively in meetings. It also supports the reader in developing a strategy for making a fundamental shift in how collaborative time is used.

Data Wise in Action: Stories of Schools Using Data to Improve Teaching and Learning

Data Wise in Action: Stories of Schools Using Data to Improve Teaching and Learning (Harvard Education Press, 2007) focuses on eight very different schools as they integrate the Data Wise Improvement Process into their daily work. It highlights the leadership challenges that schools can face at each step of the process and illustrates how educators use creativity and collaboration to overcome them.

Scaling Up Data Wise in Prince George's County Public Schools

Scaling Up Data Wise in Prince George's County (Harvard Education Press, 2017) describes ambitious efforts to scale a collaborative data-driven improvement process across 199 schools from 2014-2016. It details the strategic choices that Deputy Superintendent Dr. Monique Davis and Executive Director of the Office of Continuous Systemic Improvement Dr. David Rease make to elicit buy-in and support at all levels, the primary challenges they must overcome, and the ongoing dilemmas they continue to negotiate.

Collaboration for Literacy Improvement: The Experiences of Teacher-Researchers in the First Stages of an Inquiry Process

This study describes teachers' experiences during a data-driven inquiry process to improve literacy-related practices. This action research was initiated at an international English immersion school for native Chinese speakers. April 2021

Sustaining a Continuous Improvement Culture in Educator Preparation: A Higher Education Network Based on Data Wise 

Supported by a grant from the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, the educator preparation program at Endicott College integrated the Data Wise Improvement Process into its practice. June 2019

Step 1 

Stoplight Protocol

This protocol is intended to inform team members about the steps of the Data Wise Improvement Process and provide an opportunity for reflection about where a school is with respect to the process. It also helps participants cultivate the ACE Habit of Mind of maintaining a relentless focus on evidence.

Coherence Protocol

This protocol helps educators take stock of the specific things they are already doing to use data to improve learning and teaching. This helps to create a sense of coherence between that work and the Data Wise Improvement Process so that a team can identify a point of entry into the process. This protocol is especially effective after the Stoplight Protocol.

Equity Reflection Protocol

This protocol helps educators share their personal why story with others. Sharing stories helps participants practice “speaking their truth,” especially as it relates to how they think about the concept of equity. Hearing others’ stories helps participants receive other perspectives and begin to see how different people approach the work of equity in different ways. For guidance about creating a personal why story, see Components of a Compelling Personal Why Story. 

Shared Why Protocol

This protocol is for teams that are just forming or adding new team members. The purpose is to

support teams in organizing for collaborative work by learning about one another, identifying connections, and developing a shared why.

Plus/Delta Protocol

This protocol helps team members assess what worked well in a meeting or professional learning session and consider what they would have liked to change.

Data Wise Framework

This document shows how the Data Wise improvement process, equity questions, and ACE Habits of Mind fit together into a single framework.

Data Wise Framework with System Wise Icons

This document adds to the framework four icons representing the approach that system-level leaders use when supporting continuous improvement.

Meeting Wise Checklist

This checklist encourages team leaders to consider the meeting elements related to purpose, process, preparation, and pacing when planning or reflecting on a meeting.

Meeting Wise Agenda Template

This template provides an example of how a meeting agenda can be structured to consider all of the items on the Meeting Wise Checklist. (Meeting Wise Checklist in Spanish)

Meeting Wise Rolling Agenda Template

This template shows how to structure a single shared document that contains all of the agendas for a series of meetings. (For more information about rolling agendas, please see Meeting Wise: Making the Most of Collaborative Time for Educators.)

Step 2 

Data Literacy Scavenger Hunt Template

This template provides a structured way of understanding what data were collected or what was assessed so that educators can understand how results are reported.

Evidence Inventory Template 

This template helps educators create a list of existing and desired evidence related to the focus area, including details about the data sources and how they are used. 

Steps 3-5 

Data Overview Design Rationale Questionnaire and Data Display Checklist

This document supports leaders in thinking deeply about a data overview’s rationale before making it. The second page is the Data Display Checklist, which serves as a reminder of how to format data displays or charts so that readers can easily interpret the information they contain. 

I Notice / I Wonder Protocol

This protocol provides sentence stems that helps educators be deliberate about where statements fall on the ladder of inference and to separate low- inference claims from higher- inference questions.

Affinity Protocol 

This protocol supports teams to categorize and cluster similar forms of data together to see patterns and hypothesize relationships. The protocol takes its name from the word affinity, which means “similarity.”  In the Data Wise Improvement Process, this protocol works best in Step 5, “Examine our own practice,” when participants have already documented their specific and descriptive notes after observing practice (e.g., classroom instruction).

Steps 6-7

Instructional Core Brainstorm Protocol

This protocol supports team members to get on the same page and build common language about what will be happening when they introduce a new instructional strategy. This protocol can also work for other new strategies that are applied outside classrooms (e.g., a family engagement strategy where school leaders are working with caregivers). In this case, you would substitute “learner, facilitator, and content” for “student, teacher, and content.”

Action Plan and Plan to Assess Impact Template 

This template supports a team with documenting tasks, roles, deadlines, and success criteria associated with their action plan. It also includes a section to record which assessment tools the team will use to assess impact.  

System Wise Action Plan Template

This is an editable version of the rolling action plan template found on page 148 of System Wise: Continuous Instructional Improvement at Scale. The purpose of this document is to capture intended actions and track learning and progress as they unfold. This Example Action Plan shows what it looks like when the template is filled out.

Step 8 

Data Wise Throughline Template 

This template shows the main deliverables for Steps 2-7 of the Data Wise improvement process and the quality indicators for each deliverable. Team members use it to document their progress through an improvement cycle and check their deliverables against the quality indicators. 

Impact Story Template 

This template is for team members to share the story of their impact at the end of an improvement cycle. It focuses on evidence and learning from implementation as well as impact on learner experience and performance. It also includes a space to summarize implications for their next cycle. 

Data Wise Journey Presentation Template

This template provides a format for capturing a team's journey through the eight steps of the Data Wise Improvement Process. A universal version of the Journey Presentation Template is also best for system-level teams.

Improvement Journal Template 

This template provides an opportunity to capture a team’s learning at each phase of the Data Wise Improvement Process (Prepare, Inquire, and Act), as well as a space to capture individual and shared Why stories, reflections from the Compass Points protocol, reflections on equity, and other celebrations. 

Data Wise Journey Presentation Template

This template provides a format for capturing a team's journey through the eight steps of the Data Wise Improvement Process. A universal version of the Journey Presentation Template is also best for system-level teams.

Improvement Journal Template 

This template provides an opportunity to capture a team’s learning at each phase of the Data Wise Improvement Process (Prepare, Inquire, and Act), as well as a space to capture individual and shared Why stories, reflections from the Compass Points protocol, reflections on equity, and other celebrations. 

The ACE Habits of Mind: The Foundation of Data Wise

Educators discuss how cultivating these habits allows them to support students and colleagues to thrive.  July 2017

Gutman Book Talk: System Wise

Gutman Library Book Talk, "System Wise," with Adam Parrott-Sheffer, Carmen Williams, David Rease Jr., and Kathryn Parker Boudett. October 2024

Participant Experience: Data Wise Institute 

An interview with Data Wise institute participants from New York. February 2023

Data Wise Experience: Branchville Elementary School

Watch as Branchville Elementary teachers share their experiences with the Data Wise Journey, a structured approach to using student data for instructional improvement. Learn how they identified challenges, refined their teaching strategies, and collaborated to enhance student learning through data-driven inquiry. April 2018