SchoolStat

Purpose and Approach:

SchoolStat is a performance management initiative that seeks to transform the School District of Philadelphia into a data-driven organization, which will ultimately improve schools and student achievement. SchoolStat is a unique adaptation of other “stat programs” such as the New York City Police Department’s CompStat and Baltimore’s CitiStat. SchoolStat targets a series of measures that quantify how well the schools are performing in several areas, including: attendance, school climate, and instructional results. The cornerstone of the SchoolStat system is monthly trainings with school district leaders and principals to develop a data-driven organizational culture. In these meetings, data is used to develop strategies to improve school instruction, attendance, and climate.

SchoolStat’s primary driver for change is its ability to function as a “central nervous system” that carries information vertically up and down the chain of command and also horizontally among the regional superintendents, principals, and key central administration staff. The flow of ideas and information helps spread data-driven practices throughout the organization, including the use of real-time data for planning mid-course corrections and the use of historical trend data to plan proactive improvement strategies. SchoolStat moves beyond performance measurement and instead serves as an effective performance management program because the dynamic exchange between managers leads to data-driven action.

The Fels Institute worked closely with the School District of Philadelphia (District) for two years on the District-wide implementation of SchoolStat. During the two years, the targeted performance measures improved and the District’s organizational culture bean to incorporate the use of data as part of its management process.  As planned, the District took over full management for the 2007 school year. Fels is currently working on developing SchoolStat in other school districts in the region.

Results and Publications:

The Philadelphia School District saw the following improvements in median school rates for the period September through December 2006 as compared with the same period for the previous year (before the implementation of SchoolStat) on the following measures:

• The number of suspensions issued per 100 students has decreased from 6.00 to 3.74
• The average daily student absence rate decreased from 7.98 percent to 7.06 percent
• The average daily teacher absence rate (excluding teachers absent long-term) decreased from
• 3.68 percent to 3.14 percent
• The average daily teacher absence rate for teachers out on a long-term basis decreased from 1.97 percent to 1.82 percent

SchoolStat was also well received by the participants; in response to a survey question asking how useful SchoolStat was in helping achieve their school’s or The Philadelphia SchoolStat model region’s goals (with 5 being the highest possible score), the Regional Superintendents rated it a 4.7 and the principals a 4.2. These survey results underscore the fact that key managers embraced a data-driven organizational culture.

Reports:

The Philadelphia SchoolStat Model
SchoolStat White Paper

For more information, contact Catherine Lamb, Project Manager, at catlamb@sas.upenn.edu.