Choosing a System:Advice to keep in mind when deciding whether to buy or build or how to identify the right vendors and their products.

The result of this process is a set of specifications to use when performing Step 2: What To Buy?

1. Define general problem and scope
2. Build support
• Leadership
• Budget: remember to consider not only the cost of the product, but maintenance and per use fees.
• Stakeholders
3. Research your needs
• Requirements
• Current status: take an exhaustive inventory of your current data sources, survey user needs and goals, and choose whether to implement a data system using local staff or contractor help
• Barriers or obstacles: note where your system must be accessable to people or other information sources.

Helpful Resources

The following list of downloadable resources will aid in completing Step 1

• An analysis document designed for a school district to halp focus the issues surrounding efforts to improve the Educational Data Systems and Analytic Capacity.EDAS-BusinessCaseAnalysisSample1
• This document establishes design requirements and presents other aspects of project planning necessary for acquiring an Educational Data System designed to import, store & analyze student demographic information. 9 pages. EDAS-DataSystemRequirementsSample2
• This specification document is designed to provide explicit definition of the needs that a sample scool district has regarding their planned purchase of an Educational Data System. 3 pages. EDAS-DataSystemRequirementsSample3
• Research questions targeting how particular programs and interventions impact student achievement.EDAS-ResearchQuestionsSample1
• List of typical questions or issues to keep in mind when analyzing suitability for using internal (arbitrary) criteria in an Educational Data System. EDAS-ResearchQuestionsSample2