The education philanthropic organization Scarlett Family Foundation recently launched a new tool designed to allow parents and other education stakeholders to find information and data on schools in Nashville all in one place.¶
According to a recent announcement, the foundation’s Nashville Public Schools Data Finder gives visitors a chance to learn more about Nashville’s public schools and how they compare to each other. Tara Scarlett, the foundation’s president and CEO, said the tool makes use of publicly available data from the Tennessee Department of Education and Metro Nashville Public Schools relating to student academic performance and school personnel, among other key data sets.¶
“We pull this from the Department of Ed, or from MNPS when they release stuff to just put it together in one location in a way that's easy for people to read and understand,” she told Tennessee Firefly. “You’re looking at proficiency data, teacher retention, enrollment, absences … There's a whole range of information that you’re looking at.”¶
Scarlett noted that the foundation hopes the tool will make school data and information more readily available for stakeholders, as well as more comprehensive. She said when it comes to making decisions in or relating to education, data is everything.¶
“It's very challenging, in our view, to make decisions without data, and when we tried to look at data tied to our schools, we had a very difficult time getting good information, so we decided to make a dashboard [with school data],” she said. “It's for the community, it's for parents, for community leaders, or anyone that wants to learn about their school. We just compile the data into one resource, so it makes it easier for anyone to access and hopefully understand. We want to try to make it as easy as possible [for people] to get the information about their school.”¶
According to Scarlett, the tool can be used by parents searching for a school to enroll their children in, among other uses.¶
“It's remarkable, the number of people that look to this data,” she said. “In the end, we hope that people that are looking at this dashboard are using it for what makes sense for them, so whether it's a parent choosing a school, or an influencer using data and information to talk about [schools], we just hope that it is useful.”¶
Scarlett added that the tool has so far proven useful for parents and other stakeholders looking for information about schools in the area. She said she hopes more stakeholders make use of the tool to help guide their decision-making moving forward.¶
“The number of people that have reached out [about the tool] is fascinating to me because I just didn't really expect it. But we just wanted to be able to put this out publicly and allow people to make use of it the way they want to make use of it," she said. "I'm just happy that it’s a useful tool for [parents and others in] Nashville."¶
