Guyana introduces a national data portal with GradeMaker: Case Study

Abstract

In November 2016 the Ministry began working with GradeMaker to introduce a national data portal to help better target the school improvement effort. A particular areas of focus was to help develop the inland regions (a national priority), and build strength in STEM. A large bank of student results data (from tests at Grades 4,6,9 and 11) was loaded into the portal, with additional information about schools. There was no unique pupil identifier, so to make the data more usable, the data was linked together using ‘fuzzy matching’ technology, beginning with the Primary school results. The result was a highly searchable, rich data resource. Delivers new insights into education A suite of interactive reports was created for each stakeholder group – schools, regions and ministry officials. These have yielded a new insights into the education system in many key areas: • Primary and Secondary attainment reports, including trends over 3 years. • STEM performance (for all levels). • ‘Key Measure’ reports to reflect national policy. • ‘Topic’ reports (for Grade 6) Users access reports relevant to them across the web, or where bandwidth is lacking by personalised pdfs.