Educational management systems, though flawed, are popular

14th November 2011   ·   0 Comments

By Travis M. Andrews
Contributing Writer

Education management systems may be the answer to some of education’s most difficult problems, though some critics say they have a long way to go.

Integrated education managements systems like Jevens and Kickboard work fairly simply: they allow for teachers to compile data throughout a school and to sort through the data in various ways, searching for trends, such as problems or successes. Using web-based technology, these systems integrate different classrooms run by different teachers in a way never seen before. Until now, most data was relegated to one classroom at a time, ignoring larger trends. In these larger trends could be the answer to fixing education, but educators seem split on the effectiveness of these programs.

Jennifer Medbery, CEO and founder of Kickboard, saw the need for an integrated management system during her three years teaching at Sci Academy, the New Orleans Charter Science and Math Academy.

“I sort of came up for the idea for Kickboard because the school where I had taught here in New Orleans, we knew what data we wanted to track about students but there was no product out there,” Medbery said.

Medbery used her computer science and software development background and began work on what is now Kickboard, a “web-based program that teachers and other educators log into to track progress in a collaborative way.”

“All elements of student progress are captured and shared,” said Medbery. “So everyone is on the same page and has one place to go to see information in a global way.”

She said the program, which works across classrooms in a school, helps find patterns that can then be approached as solvable problems, making teachers “partners in this war.”

“Each teacher operates as an island, and there is no real way to instantly communicate to the rest to the school what is happening your classroom,” Medbery said. “Kick­board allows you to do that.”

She said the program, used in New Orleans as well as 14 states across the country, is such a success because of its ease of use.

“It’s web-based, the fact that everything is centralized and accessible 24/7 and that a lot of design work went into making it easy to use,” Medbery said. “Teachers like how easy it is to use, how efficient it is, how intuitive it is to navigate.”

Other programs, such as Target Teach and Jevens, do similar things and are also used across the state.

Lafayette Academy uses Target Teach, something Mickey Landry, head of the Lafayette Academy, finds extraordinarily helpful.

One particular area in which the program helps, according to Landry, is testing assessments. Every year, four assessment tests are given, based on Louisiana standards. The teachers are required to teach these standards, and the tests determine if the students are adequately learning them.

The program allows for Landry and his colleges to discover where there are educational holes.

“The teacher can look very quickly, and I can to, at how many students answered B for a given question,” Landry said. “And we can, at that point, we can determine what the issue might have been if say 10 out of 25 children answered B and the real answer was D.”

In the past, though, this was done by hand. The process was so slow, often students would fall behind further before the problem was identified, if it was at all.

“Putting them through the scanner then having the results immediately available is just an amazing improvement over old school types of things,” Landry said. “That’s been very helpful.”

And the fact that the program works across classrooms and can be personalized to the school makes it even more beneficial.

“It’s to personalize learning so that each student gets exactly what she or he needs and gets it in a timely manner,” Landry said. “The software program is great but the fact that it works in concert with a larger system is really an amazing tool.”

Some, though, think there is work left to be done on these systems.

A faculty member of Batiste Cultural Arts, who wishes to remain anonymous, said there was a lot of work left to do. In the past two years, Batiste has used both Kickboard and Jevens, which had their ups and downs.

“I think that they can be very helpful, but for Kickboard, the technology was underdeveloped,” said the source. “The schools are trying to get things started, but they’re still developing how things works … so not all the components that were advertised or were promised would work, work.”

Often times, these were simple compatibility issues such as which program can work in conjunction with which other program (think finding a charger for a cell phone: They all charge but only certain ones work with certain brands). At other times, the issues were ones of teachers just not having the time to figure out complicated programs with the teaching load on their laps.

“This isn’t actually making things easier because people don’t actually have time to test them out or figure out how they work. Generally, I think that the fact that you’re able to track things like skills is super beneficial, and for a teacher, I think it’s beneficial because I know what skills I need to work on more based on the tests I give.”

Some programs, though, take it a step further and offer analyses of the results. SABIS, an international system of teaching used in 15 countries that began in Lebanon in 1886, still exists today and offers more than just a data program, which has been around since at least 2001, far longer than programs like Kickboard.

Catherine Boozer, principal of Milestone SABIS Academy of New Orleans, one of the two Louisiana schools that use the SABIS program, said the company will actually monitor data entered into the system and contact her with suggestions and questions.

“It makes my job so much easier,” she said of the program. “I think it’s phenomenal.”

This hands-on approach is what separates SABIS from other systems such as Jevens and Kickboard, along with the fact that SABIS is more than just a computer program: It is a system of teaching. Used in both private and charter schools, SABIS is, in some ways, an educational equalizer.

“Charter school kids are receiving a private school education for free,” Boozer said.

And the SABIS program also helps students improve in their weaker areas, which is beneficial to both the school and the students. It does this through the company’s interaction mixed with its data program.

“Students cannot fail in peace [under SABIS],” Boozer said.

Regardless, programs like Jevens and Kickboard are gaining popularity, though Medbery said she personally hopes they are never state-mandated, as so many other educational improvements are.

“Requiring a school to use something rather than it be something they decide to use to improve … can sometimes be opposing forces,” Medbery said. “The fact that a state might mandate this is not necessarily relevant to our success or a school’s success. We’ll get it. … [Schools] recognize the impact.”

Kira Jones, who is running against Louella Givens for the BESE board District 2 seat, said she thinks these programs are extremely positive but could never see them being mandated, and she would personally never mandate them.

“I do see a lot of demand in … high-performing schools that are very data-driven,” Jones said. “I do think, as a general principal, data is good.”

She said she thinks schools will use it based on personal need.

“I think it’s school-specific, how schools and classrooms use it,” Jones said.

Though contacted several times, Givens did not comment by press time.

A representative for the Louisiana Department of Education, also contacted several times, said he needed time to research the programs and could not be reached again by press time.

This article was originally published in the November 14, 2011 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper