Data Literacy for Educators: Making It Count in Teacher Preparation and Practice

Abstract

(Teachers College Press), tackles a salient aspect of modern teaching practice: the use of data to inform decision-making. Over the past decade and a half, new and diverse sources and forms of data have proliferated within the education sector (e.g., interim/benchmark assessments, school climate data), as have new technologies (e.g., data management systems) by which to manage, access, and analyze such data. Mandinach and Gummer argue that this influx of data and the availability of tools to work with them necessitate new teacher competencies, namely a construct the authors term "data literacy for teachers" (DLFT). Data Literacy for Educators is a product of the authors' decade-long intellectual project. This book review considers Data Literacy for Educators holistically, and is written from the perspective of an academic engaged in DLFT work in both practice (pre-service teacher education) and research. In addition to summarizing the volume, this review critically evaluates its content breadth, depth, and relevance for various stakeholders. Given particular attention during the review are the following stakeholders: teacher educators, including university faculty; professional development providers, as well as educational researchers; and PreK-12 education practitioners (i.e., teachers and leaders). Across eight chapters, the book presents an exceptional high-level summary of the state of the DLFT field. Mandinach and Gummer situate recent emphasis on DLFT within the contexts of data use in fields other than education, such as business and sports; educational policies like the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act; teacher professional standards and licensure requirements; and the assessment-driven educational accountability movement in the U.S. Crucially, the book also both proposes a comprehensive definition of and conceptual framework for the DLFT construct and surveys central research on DLFT. Finally, Data Literacy for Educators systemically examines the construct from the perspectives of diverse education actors and constituencies (e.g., local education agencies, policymakers, and testing companies) and offers some suggestions for building DLFT capacity through (especially pre-service) teacher education. Data Literacy for Educators' most paramount contribution is the delineation of a robust and integrative DLFT definition and conceptual framework. Mandinach and Gummer describe a years-long iterative and systematic domain-analytic process by which they arrived at their definition of this complex and multifaceted construct. In the book, DLFT is defined as: