Information Rich, Knowledge Poor

We've all heard the phrase "data rich, information poor," but now we are facing a new challenge: we're becoming information rich, knowledge poor. In the past, we've needed to make sense of all kinds of data and now it seems that every day we have a new system or tool that is purporting to turn our data into information. But what does the information really tell us?

Here's an example: once upon a time we talked about percent of students at levels 1-4. Now we can see what percent of students are at levels 1-4 over time and compared to different populations. If we see we are making progress, great - but why? Our information is helping us see what is happening in our classes and in our schools, but why do we see these results? As more "what" inputs are being presented, we might find ourselves becoming led further away from our focus on "why."

So what can we do about this issue? We need to start (or continue) to approach the data from a multivariate angle - multiple inputs leading to multiple outputs. Simple descriptive statistics don't cut it when we are looking at complex data systems. And assessment data do not show the whole story so we need to include perception data and more! Thus, I challenge all of us who have the charge of turning a mountain of information into useful gems of knowledge to consider new ways of analyzing educational data. We don't need to reinvent the wheel, we just have to sharpen our tools and tackle that mountain!