Apples, Pears and DRIPS – supporting data-driven decision-making

We recently held a wonderful online seminar with representatives from seven east London local authorities discussing how to share information as pupils move from primary to secondary school. Although this was focussed around our SixIntoSeven product and the free-to-use lite version for neighbouring schools and Partner Local Authorities, it raised some fundamental issues. 

DRIP – Data Rich Information Poor 

The first fundamental issue was DRIP. This might not be something with which you are familiar: I certainly wasn’t, but it was a problem for the London Borough of Barking and Dagenham (LBBD) before they started their partnership with Pupil Pathways.  

DRIP, for the uninitiated, stands for Data Rich, Information Poor. 

A quick search shows this is not a new term, dating back to the early 1980s. It describes an organisation which collects vast amounts of data, but the data is not organised in a way to make it useful: i.e., to help identify priorities; to support interventions; and to celebrate successes. 

Consider a large 11-16 secondary school. It collects attendance data for the morning and afternoon sessions for 190 days. With one thousand on roll that is a staggering amount of data points. A quick calculation puts the figure at 380,000 data points. 

How can that be broken down to see patterns of absence, of truancy, both internal and external so that proactive steps can be taken? 

This problem was highlighted in The Difference’s report Who is losing learning?: The case for reducing exclusions across mainstream schools, co-authored with the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR). For example, it states that “The exclusions continuum sheds light on types of lost learning currently invisible in the official data.” 

You can read more about Pupil Pathways’ response to this report here. 

So how can Pupil Pathways help? 

We all know the expression “comparing apples and pears” and this can be a fundamental problem in making data work for us: to enable the transformation of data into information which can help us work more effectively. If data is coming in from multiple places, such as different schools, how can it be compared? If this is the case, how can the most vulnerable pupils who need the most support be identified? 

The Pupil Pathways methodology is to promote consistency in how data is collected in the first place. This allows for the identification of patterns so scarce resources can be allocated to the most vulnerable and, critically, progress to be monitored by a wider range of professionals. 

At this point, we can almost hear the cry “you are not treating the children as individuals”. Fortunately, we are. Remember what you were taught on your first day as an educational professional: “be consistent”. A skilled professional combines this consistency with the needs of individual pupils and in doing so, becomes an inspiration for those around them. 

At Pupil Pathways we have worked over many years with such professionals to ensure that all our services have the same underpinning philosophy. Consistency and individual needs are not mutually exclusive.  

Next Steps 

Find out more about how Pupil Pathways can help you deliver a consistent approach to your local authority and help avoid both the apple and pears conundrum and, of course, becoming a DRIP.