VT Census Case Studies : Massachusetts Longitudinal Education Data

Created and last modified by ziemer on 11 Jun 2015

Variables included in the Dataset:

K-12

  • Demographics
  • School
  • District
  • Attendance/Dropout
  • Grades/GPA
  • Courses
  • Test scores
  • ACT/SAT
  • Disciplinary action
  • Teacher info (salaries, etc.)

Higher Education

  • Demographics
  • Type of college
  • Enrollment
  • Courses
  • Major
  • Grades
  • Tuition/Scholarships

Workforce

  • Demographics
  • Salary
  • Industry

Link: http://www.doe.mass.edu/infoservices/ 

 

Date Inventory Completed: 6/2/15

Screening

  • Is there data available for 2013?
  • Can we access the data by August 15th?

Does this dataset appear to meet our needs for the Census study? YES

Explanation: They have a large quantity of K-12 data at the student-level data have began to track most students through their respective higher education institutions in Massachusetts. The process for requests involves submitting a project proposal and, if approved, signing an MOU. We submitted the research questions we plan to pursue for the Census project (e.g., school to work transitions) and received feedback that the proposal does not have enough of a connection to instruction improvement, which is one of the requirements of FERPA. According to their interpretation of FERPA, they release data only to studies that will help Massachusetts improve instruction. In addition, they indicated that they already have quite a few research projects looking at college enrollment and outcomes, and so "wouldn't be strongly inclined to support additional projects in this area."

Full Inventory

Purpose

  • What is the purpose of the organization collecting the data?

“To provide analysis, research, and tools to inform decision-making and to support high quality planning and implementation for ESE’s [(Elementary and Secondary Education)] highest priority initiatives.”

  • Who else uses the data? (make a note if they sell the data to companies)

Data is used by researchers and state officials


Description

  • What is the general topic of the data?
  • K-12 Student Information
  • Higher Education Student Information
  • Workforce Information
  • Longitudinal Education Information (includes K-12, Higher Ed, and/or Workforce)

 

  • What are the earliest and latest dates for which data is available?

For higher education data that can potentially be linked, data is available from 2004-2014. Just K-12 data goes further back.

  • How soon after a reference period ends can a data source be prepared and provided?

Depends on how much data is being requested, not specified.


Method

  • What is the data collection method (portal, other)?

Unknown

  • What is the raw source of the collected data (teacher, superintendent)?

Unknown

 

Selectivity (conversely, the representativeness)

  • What is the universe (e.g., population) that the data represents?

Public, private, tech, and charter K-12 schools and Massachusetts higher education institutions (not specified if it is all of them).


Stability/Coherence

  • Note any changes to the universe of data being captured (e.g., including private schools).

Unknown

  • Note any changes to the data capture method or sources of data.

Spoke with a Education Data Services employee (Paula Willis) who mentioned that they recently started collected more data on students (i.e. storing their GPAs and tracking them as much as possible through their higher education pursuits).


Metadata

  • Is there a description of each variable in the source along with their valid values?

Yes

  • Are there unique IDs for unique elements that can be used for linking data?

Yes

  • Can K-12 be linked to higher ed or higher ed to workforce?

K-12 can be linked to higher education, they do not have workforce data yet

  • Links to codebooks:

http://www.doe.mass.edu/infoservices/data/scs/ 

http://www.doe.mass.edu/infoservices/data/scs/SCS-DataHandbook.pdf 

 

Accuracy

  • Any known sources of error?

Unknown

  • Describe any quality control checks performed by the state (or data manager).

Unknown

 

Accessibility

  • How is the school-level data accessed (note if it needs to be screen scraped)?

On website and can be downloaded as csv

  • How is the student-level data accessed?

Need to submit a data request that is a brief (around 1 page) description of what data we are requesting and what our project goal is. Also need to sign a MOU

  • Note if IRB is needed or any other restrictions on accessing data.

No IRB required.

  • Any records or fields collected, but not included in data source?

If there are less than 10 students in a respective group, that data is excluded for privacy reasons.

  • Cost? - One time or annual or project based payment?

No cost.

 

Privacy and security

  • Note any confidentiality policies or legal limitations other than FERPA:

N/A

  • What do they consider personally identifiable information?

Student names


Research

  • What research has been done with this dataset?

Research being done conducts “data analysis and design tools, processes, and evaluations to serve ESE program offices and other key constituencies.”

  • Research links:

http://www.doe.mass.edu/research/research-eval.html 

Describe any other notes you have or any gaps/concerns you see with this dataset: It is a bit unclear how many students are actually being tracked through higher education, since it is not all of them.