The Vermont Agency of Education (AOE), through funding from a 4.9 million dollar grant from the U.S. Department of Education, is in the final stages of developing and implementing a Statewide Longitudinal Data System (SLDS) to support the work of the AOE and Vermont school districts. A significant portion of the federal award supports the creation of a system to automate education data submissions to the state from Supervisory Unions / Supervisory Districts (SU/SD), known as Vertical Reporting.
The SLDS is intended to enhance the ability of Vermont to efficiently and accurately manage, analyze, and use education data. The SLDS should help all Vermont education stakeholders to make data-informed decisions to improve student learning and outcomes; as well as to facilitate research to increase student achievement and close achievement gaps. The SLDS also supports state and federal reporting requirements.
- Memo: Statewide Longitudinal Data System Rollout Update
- Memo: Statewide Longitudinal Data System, Update Fall 2017
- Presentation on SLDS, June 2017
- Press Release: 24 States Win Grants For Longitudinal Data Systems - June 20, 2012 Source: National Center for Education Statistics
- Grant Proposal: VADR project abstract and proposal
Grant Background
The Statewide Longitudinal Data System (SLDS) Grant Program, run by the US Department of Education's Institute of Education Sciences (IES), has awarded competitive, cooperative agreement grants to states since 2005. These grants extend for three to five years for varying amounts of money. The SLDS grant program "has helped propel the successful design, development, implementation, and expansion of K12 and P-20W (early learning through the workforce) longitudinal data systems.
These systems are intended to enhance the ability of States to efficiently and accurately manage, analyze, and use education data, including individual student records. The SLDSs should help states, districts, schools, educators, and other stakeholders to make data-informed decisions to improve student learning and outcomes; as well as to facilitate research to increase student achievement and close achievement gaps." More information about the SLDS Grant Program can be found atthe National Center for Education Statistics.
Vertical Reporting and Operational Data Store Vendor Selected
The Agency of Education is pleased to announce the selection of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt’s (HMH) edFusion software as the state’s longitudinal data system. The edFusion solution will enable us to streamline data submissions and will provide a high quality data warehouse and analytics tool for state and district use. The edFusion solution enables integration of disparate data sources into one unified platform to support program and instructional improvement based on Vermont identified criteria and timely data.
Project Governance Committee
The VADR project will be governed by the VADR Project Governance Committee. This committee will be comprised of Agency of Education staff and representatives from Vermont's Supervisory Unions and Schools.
SLDS Resources
SLDS: Instructions for Flat File Specifications
SLDS: Master Data Elements by Submission
SLDS: Submission Build Guidance
Contact Information
For all other VADR Project and SLDS information, please email the SLDS Support Group, AOE.SLDSSupportGroup@vermont.gov.
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