Measure What Matters: An Introduction to Our Community Data Dashboard

Our partnership tracks data that shows where our children and young people are on eight community-wide indicators, and we provided up to date access to this data on our Data Dashboard. This data is important to track not because it shows that our children are failing or that hard work is not being done by our community, but that the systems currently in place are still not working equitably for all. Our Black, Latinx, and Native American students are experiencing these inequities at higher rates than their white peers.

Data is a powerful tool in this work, but without an equity lens it can do more harm than good.

As you explore this data, we encourage you to keep these insights in mind:

Talent is equally distributed, opportunity is not. Student-level data provides important information to support continuous improvement and track progress over time. However, this data is the result of systemic, structural, and institutional inequities.

Getting to root causes. Data can help tell us what is, but not as easily why it is. Assumptions are often made as to why the data looks the way it does, and solutions developed without including children, youth, and families with lived experiences. Our partnership seeks to draw on this rich qualitative data to idenitfy root causes of inequities.

Shifting Power Dynamics. True systems transformation requires that community members most marginalized by current systems, including those who do not hold formal authority, are at the table to co-design solutions that truly work for the communities we serve.

Gaps in Opportunity Not Achievement

Achievement gap is often used when referring to differences in academic outcomes. These disparities are most often observed for Black, Hispanic/Latinx, Indigenous students, lower-income students, non-native English speakers, and those living in rural communities.

C2C is joining other organizations in using the term “opportunity gap” to more accurately describe what is happening in our communities – inequitable systems are not providing the opportunities and resources for all children to succeed and thrive.

Shifting langauge alone will not eliminate the pervasive inequities faced by children, but there is power in words. This langugae is part of shifting narratives and empowering communties to put the responsibility on systems to change.

 

We encourage you to explore more by visiting our Data Dashboard.