When Ben Marsh first joined the International School of Myanmar (ISM) as Director in 2019, he made a simple-sounding request, “Show me all the data.” There was no shortage of statistical information about the school’s 900+ students, including Advanced Placement (AP) and SAT scores, MAP testing, and internal data. Gathering and organizing all that data proved arduous, but it was important to help the incoming school leader focus on strategic goals. “I wanted to gain an understanding of where our learning was at and where there were gaps.”
The data revealed a disparity. Marsh said, “Our math scores were off the charts but our reading scores were below average [compared to other international schools in East Asia].” That realization led to what Marsh describes as a “big-time goal: to improve reading levels throughout the school.”
School leaders don’t have the luxury of tackling only one challenge at a time. During the ensuing months, Marsh and his team faced disruptions from both the Covid pandemic and a military coup in Myanmar. Nonetheless, they kept their focus on “pushing through with our strategic goals. That was more manageable than what was happening on the outside.”
A breakthrough came during a conference call with other school Heads who were also wrestling with Covid challenges. Dr. Shabbi Luthra of the Learning Analytics Collaborative (LAC) explained how LAC tools enable schools to organize and visualize their data in support of student learning. “A lightbulb went off,” Marsh recalls. “I want to be able to look at our data at a click, and then I want our teachers to be able to do the same thing. That fit with my overall goal of collective teacher efficacy and establishing that culture at our school.”
In hindsight, Marsh recognizes the importance of establishing school wide goals before partnering with LAC. “I was able to show the faculty, particularly with reading, that our goal is to be either at or above average [for the region]. We talked about consistency of curriculum, and that LAC is going to help us reach our goals.”
To move forward, the senior leadership team employed four essential practices:
Those four practices continue to be reinforced today.
Measurable Results
Since embarking on its data journey, ISM has documented steady gains toward its strategic goals to communicate trends, both schoolwide and in smaller cohorts.
(Photo source: ISM)
Having student data readily available means “we’re not guessing. When you see measurable improvement, then you ask, OK, what was the intervention? What changed? You can get teachers to reflect on that.”
The middle school math team, for example, decided to investigate why students were struggling with statistics. Their conversations revealed that the statistics unit was not one that teachers enjoyed; they typically pushed it to the end of the year when learning can feel rushed. By shifting the curriculum to put statistics early in the school year, they saw gains in understanding, and also improved student readiness for high school, including higher Advanced Placement scores. “Increasing AP scores was not a target,” Marsh says, “but because the data is available, teachers could see the trends.”
The leadership team also uses data to get a better view of individual teacher growth. Developing a dashboard enables leaders to identify individual teachers’ strengths as well as areas for growth. “We can recognize a teacher who is doing great things [based on student outcomes]. Let’s have them share professionally with their colleagues. What are they doing to get that growth in students?” Similarly, the teacher dashboards help to identify those who may benefit from specific interventions.
Teachers have been receptive to the dashboard “because we don’t use it as a punitive measure,” Marsh emphasizes. “It’s not part of teacher evaluation. We use it to improve student learning.”
Having teachers consistently reflect on how their teaching practices affect student outcomes is a rarity in education. Says Marsh, “This is the first time I've been a part of a school where we can look at the data and we can show that the interventions and the goals and the collaboration that we put in place have had a positive learning impact for the entire school cohort over time.” That underscores his belief that “our core business is learning. If we really want to show learning and not just guess at what we’re doing, we have to show empirical evidence.”
Documented outcomes, presented in easy-to-grasp visualizations, also create positive conversations with parents. For the school leader, “it’s incredibly powerful to be able to stand in front of your parents and show over time what we’ve been able to do.”
Moving Forward
After five years at ISM, Marsh is preparing for his next opportunity, leading the American School of Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. (His first question upon arrival will be, “Show me all the data.”)
He has no doubt that the data culture he has helped to build at ISM will remain strong. “This is not a Ben Marsh thing,” he insists. “This is ISM—it’s our culture.”
Read how Oberoi International School is Building a Data Culture and how Zurich International School is Sharing Data with Parents.
Suzie Boss is a writer and global educational consultant who focuses on the power of teaching, learning, and storytelling to improve lives and transform communities. The author of a dozen books on project-based learning and other innovative practices, she is a regular contributor to Edutopia and an adviser to Consilience. A frequent conference presenter, she consults with schools around the world interested in shifting to a more student-centered approach to teaching and learning.
Website: https://suzieboss.com/
Ben Marsh is the Director of The American School of Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of Congo. He is an accomplished educational leader with a global footprint. He has dedicated his career to fostering data-driven cultures in international schools. Originally from Colorado and Montana, United States of America, Ben began his overseas journey in 2004 as a Grade 5 teacher in Lesotho. Since then, he has held leadership roles in Lesotho, Bangladesh, Malaysia, and Myanmar. As the Director of the International School of Myanmar, Ben was a driving force in integrating data analytics, a move that significantly enhanced collective efficacy among educators. Ben's passion for data began as a middle school teacher in Vancouver, Washington, where he leveraged STAR Reading and Accelerated Reader programs. His experience underscores his belief in the transformative power of data to improve educational outcomes and foster collaborative environments.
