Why is collecting, analyzing, gleaning insights, and making changes based on data so difficult? This is a loaded, multilayered question. But it’s an important one, and one that NAIS wants to tackle.

During a time when many independent schools are getting serious about embracing data and using it to bring about transformational change, NAIS is on a serious journey to transform the way we work with data to support schools and to help them evolve.

While some member schools have the resources to maintain an in-house institutional researcher, others have shared with NAIS that they would like help digging deeper into their data to uncover patterns that may not have been obvious from a cursory review. To that end, we are exploring creative ways to work with school data. In addition to providing a big-picture overview of national trends in the annual Trendbook and myriad research reports, this has come in the form of informal chats with heads of school, data discussions that stem from a specific data request to our research team, responses people have from quick-turnaround data we share in the form of presentations or blogs, as well as more formal deep data dives with schools. Our goal is to have more personal conversations with school leads to learn about key successes and challenges; collect a variety of school-level data in an efficient, streamlined manner; conduct a unique analysis using the school data, DASL data, and data from our Demographic Center; and reflect the data back to schools to spur strategic planning and action.

Through this type of one-on-one work (with individuals or a team of school leads), we’ve learned some valuable lessons and gained important insights that will guide our continued efforts to help schools use their data in a way that benefits them.

The Challenge of High-Quality Data Analysis

Often, part of the challenge is that schools are working to build a strong infrastructure that allows data from different divisions to speak to each other. Some are still operating with data collection procedures and platforms that vary for each school lead, which may change as personnel changes. For example, if someone leaves the school, the new lead may need to reinvent the wheel and create a new process for collecting key data points. If that happens a few times, the consistency of the data will be lacking; trying to get a five-year data picture may be virtually impossible.

Even when schools have a strong data infrastructure and consistently track their data over time, it can be challenging to know how to make sense of it all. This is sometimes called the “mounds of data” problem. There’s too much, and it’s not clear where schools should start. This is where the conversation with NAIS begins. We start by sitting with a few school leads, from finance to admission to the head of school, to discuss and listen to what has been working particularly well or not at all. Schools tend to be self-aware, and so when we ask about key successes and challenges, school leads can tell us what those are very quickly. We have seen value in group conversations with the entire team as well as individual chats where school leads can open up to our team, knowing that we take confidentiality very seriously. These conversations are critical because we learn what a school’s priorities are and what it would like to learn from its data.

How We Put Data Together

When we talk with school leads about their school, we get a picture from their narrative. With this helpful context, we can then explore the data NAIS has at its disposal, including from DASL and the Demographic Center. For example, we use the Demographic Center to get a picture of the key characteristics of a school’s surrounding area. When we look at the cities or ZIP codes of families whose students attend a school, we can also do comparisons of those cities or towns based on variables like household income distribution and five-year growth projections for families of a certain income level.

We can use DASL data to compare enrollments among independent schools in a particular area over a five- or 10-year period so the changes can be reviewed in context. Are all schools in the area facing declines during this time, or is it just one school? Are they all facing decline but some much steeper than others? During a deep-dive analysis with a school, we can have thoughtful conversations about what schools are relevant comparisons. For some schools, it may be those most geographically close. For others, it may be less about geographic proximity and more about similar schools nationwide based on size and other key school demographics. We can also use DASL to look at enrollment by grade over a period of time to better understand if enrollment declines are concentrated in a particular school division or set of grades.

During a data dive with a school, we work closely with school leads to gather specific sets of data related to enrollment, admissions, and operating budget. The NAIS data and school-provided data complement each other well. For example, a DASL comparison of attrition for different years can include comparison schools. However, with school data we can look at attrition by grade level for different years to hone in on specific grade levels that may be experiencing higher churn. By bringing these data sets in conversation with each other, we have a more holistic picture of what attrition looks like in a particular school, along with its comparison to peers locally or nationally. Sometimes by putting different pieces of data together for the first time, we can see things we couldn’t see before.

Here’s another example: If a school provides us with de-identified addresses of its families, we can calculate the average distance between home and school by grade level, and we can use this information in our Demographic Center to look at markets in the surrounding area within that driving radius. When we do a cross-check with those markets and the student list, we can highlight untapped markets in reasonable geographic proximity to the school. For schools that want to to keep this information confidential, we can show them how to calculate this themselves. It’s not important that NAIS conduct all of the analyses: In fact, the more we can help the school analyze its own data, the better we feel about the deep-dive data process.

A Focus on Finances

Another key part of a deep dive involves exploring a school’s financial health. We work closely with a financial consultant, who helps inform our approach and acts as sounding board and guide. We focus largely on operating budget, specifically looking at actual cash in and cash out.

Using a tool created by our financial consultant, we allocate the school’s operating budget by school division, so school leads can better identify their loss leaders or differences in spending by division.

In addition to the operating budget, we look at net tuition revenue by grade level. With school information about financial aid awards with grade level specified, we are able to calculate the percentage of each grade on financial aid, the average award per grade, and number of awards and award dollars
by school division.

Net tuition revenue data enables us to show a comparison of gross tuition by grade alongside net tuition revenue by grade, so it is easy to tell what grades seem to be the most costly to the school. Net tuition revenue information pairs nicely with attrition information by grade level, bringing to light the correlation between grades with high financial aid (seemingly to keep student counts up) and high attrition (indicating that financial aid may not be a successful method for retaining students).

By reviewing the operating budget and talking to school leads, we are able to determine the school’s level of debt. For example, how long the debt has been on the school’s shoulders, how many more years the school is projected to have the debt, and how much trouble a school is in when it comes to repaying the debt. That isn’t always readily apparent from a cursory review of the budget numbers.

Putting the Pieces Together

The key challenge after doing a variety of data slicing is figuring out how to reflect this data back to our schools in an accessible, digestible, and comprehensible way.

When we create presentations for a school, we approach it with the mindset of trimming and organizing the data in ways that make the most sense to our school leads. We put key insights based on the data on each slide, with takeaway points for each piece of data. We vet the data and insights with the head of school and other school leads prior to a larger meeting, which helps create buy-in from key players in the conversation. We then serve as a guide as school leads adapt the findings for a presentation to their board.

When we’ve debriefed with school leads and our internal team, we’ve learned how valuable it is for
schools to have an NAIS team at their disposal for even a short period of time. They’ve had a chance to review their data in ways that they haven’t done in the past by an independent party who has no agenda or stakes in the school’s policies. We’ve also learned which data are most critical to data deep dives and how important the qualitative component (i.e., interviews with school leads) is in providing context for the numbers. This kind of feedback is critical as we continue to prototype ways to support our schools with innovative analytical approaches.

As we continue to push our thinking and approaches to how we can best engage with schools, we want school leaders to think about the state of their school: data infrastructure, data collection and storage processes, analytic capabilities, and how those reports are translating into key conversations and decisions for the school. What systems and processes are in place and which need further scrutiny? Does the school have the staff capability to do this work, or does it need extra support?

The opportunity to work closely with member schools to understand their data and use it to create positive change is a meaningful way for NAIS to carry out its mission—and to engage in transformational work of our own.

Conversation Starters

When we meet with school leads, we guide the conversation with some key questions. Here’s how you can frame your own discussions.

Introduction

How long have you been at the school?
What are your main areas of responsibility?
What are the school’s greatest strengths? In other words, what is going well?
What are the school’s greatest challenges?
What do you think is driving the challenges you are seeing?
Are there any barriers keeping the school from moving forward on any of those challenges?
What are your top priorities for the current year? For next year?

Data Processes

What data are you in charge of?
How is that data stored?
Do you overwrite your data every year or do you keep historic records?
What data do you look at most frequently?
What reports do you run for conversations with your leadership team and with faculty?
What data/reports do you use for the board meetings?

Supplementary Data

What kind of questions would you be most excited for us to dig into with you and your data?
What data points or key questions have you received from your board that you would like us to explore?