Library
True to our non-profit nature, we believe in sharing our knowledge. We’re motivated by something greater than the bottom-line. We believe in supporting both the health of the education system in the United States and the well-being of each and every student. So we make a point to share what we learn with others who are positioned to make a difference, too.
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Evidence-Based Practices for Assessing Students' Social and Emotional Well-Being
This brief is one in a series aimed at providing K-12 education decision makers and advocates with an evidence base to ground discussions about how to best serve students during and following the novel coronavirus pandemic.
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Evidence-Based Practices for Assessing Students' Social and Emotional Well-Being
An IRT Mixture Model for Rating Scale Confusion Associated with Negatively Worded Items in Measures of Social-Emotional Learning
We used mixture IRT models to evaluate confusion due to the negative wording of certain items on a social-emotional learning (SEL) survey. We also evaluated the consequences of the potential confusion. We found evidence of rating scale confusion due to negatively worded items. We also found that confusion was most prevalent at lower grade levels and was positively related to both reading proficiency and ELL status.
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An IRT Mixture Model for Rating Scale Confusion Associated with Negatively Worded Items in Measures of Social-Emotional Learning
Trends in Student Social-Emotional Learning: Evidence From the First Large-Scale Panel Student Survey
We used social-emotional learning survey data to simulate how four constructs—growth mindset, self-efficacy, self-management, and social awareness—develop from grades 4 to 12 and how these trends vary by gender, socioeconomic status, and race/ethnicity among students for two consecutive years. We found that, with the exception of growth mindset, self-reports of these constructs do not increase monotonically as students move through school; self-efficacy, social awareness, and, to a lesser degree, self-management decrease after Grade 6.
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Trends in Student Social-Emotional Learning: Evidence From the First Large-Scale Panel Student Survey
SEL Best Practices Guide
This guide outlines the steps that organizations might consider for measuring students’ social and emotional learning (SEL). We highlight the lessons we have learned from the research that Education Analytics has conducted on SEL survey measures. We also discuss future directions of SEL measurement that policymakers and practitioners at the state and district level should consider.
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SEL Best Practices Guide
Can We Measure Classroom Supports for Social-Emotional Learning?
We applied value-added models to student surveys in the CORE Districts to explore whether social-emotional learning (SEL) surveys can be used to measure effective classroom-level supports for SEL. We found that classrooms differ in their effect on students’ growth in self-reported SEL—even after accounting for school-level effects.
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Can We Measure Classroom Supports for Social-Emotional Learning?
School Differences in Social–Emotional Learning Gains: Findings From the First Large-Scale Panel Survey of Students
Using the first large-scale panel surveys of students on SEL, we produced school-level value-added measures by grade for growth mindset, self-efficacy, self-management, and social awareness. We found substantive differences across schools in SEL growth, with magnitudes of differences similar to those for growth in academic achievement, but weaker goodness of fit and smaller across-school variance, suggesting caution in interpreting such measures as causal impacts of schools on SEL.
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School Differences in Social–Emotional Learning Gains: Findings From the First Large-Scale Panel Survey of Students
Measuring Students’ Social-Emotional Learning Among California’s CORE Districts: An IRT Modeling Approach
We analyzed the psychometric properties of items from California's CORE Districts' annual SEL survey. We compared items' functionality across grades, compared student outcomes from IRT models and the classical approach, made suggestions on approaches to modeling and scaling the SEL survey data, and identified items, by grade, that do not contribute positively to measurement of each outcome. We also discussed policy implications in using SEL measures among educators, administrators, policymakers, and other stakeholders.
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Measuring Students’ Social-Emotional Learning Among California’s CORE Districts: An IRT Modeling Approach
The Influence of Rapidly Guessed Item Responses on Teacher Value-Added Estimates
We examined whether rapid guessing behaviors varied by grade, subject, and teacher, and we evaluated if rapid guessing influenced teacher value-added estimates. We found that rapid guessing occurs frequently enough that educators should be mindful of its effect on the interpretations of student test results, but rapid guessing did not appear to affect estimates of teacher performance.
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The Influence of Rapidly Guessed Item Responses on Teacher Value-Added Estimates
Building Shared Data Infrastructure for School-Based Nonprofits
When we talk with school-based nonprofit partners, we hear a consistent concern: the data they need to support students, learn across sites, and demonstrate impact often arrives too late, in too many formats, and with too much local interpretation required. City Year, a national education nonprofit whose AmeriCorps members serve as student success coaches in schools across 29 U.S. cities, describes this as a shared infrastructure problem rather than a single-organization challenge. In this blog, Vice President of Strategic Philanthropy and Innovation Dan Jarratt describes this shared infrastructure problem, uses City Year's work as a case study in strengthening data infrastructure, and highlights how Education Analytics (EA) is committed to building and stewarding that infrastructure.
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Building Shared Data Infrastructure for School-Based Nonprofits
Five Years, Six Networks, and a Foundation for What Came Next
At the start of 2026, Education Analytics (EA) closed out a five-year grant that became one of the most formative chapters in EA’s history. The work — supporting six Networks for School Improvement (NSIs) across California through the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation — pioneered infrastructure that helped shape many of the products that EA builds today. Services Delivery Lead Brianna Pollari and Senior Technical Program Manager of Data Science Drew McDermott, who were heavily involved in NSI work, describe the challenges and triumphs of building this infrastructure in this blog.
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Five Years, Six Networks, and a Foundation for What Came Next
EA Stack Series Part IV: Giving District Data a Platform with Podium with Katie O'Brien
April 17, 2026
In the latest episode of the DatabasED podcast, co-hosts Molly Stewart (Senior Project Manager) and Rosh Dhanawade (VP of Product) sit down with Katie O'Brien (Senior Product Manager) at Education Analytics to explore Podium, EA's data visualization platform built for education leaders.
Katie shares how Podium helps districts, schools, and state agencies answer the big questions they face every day, from tracking chronic absenteeism to understanding student behavior and enrollment trends. The conversation dives into how Podium's core dashboard suite provides quick, reliable insights while also giving districts the flexibility to build custom dashboards tailored to their unique initiatives.
The episode also unpacks the technical side of building a scalable business intelligence platform in education. Katie discusses how EA leverages tools like Apache Superset (via Preset), Ed-Fi data standards, and the Stadium data warehouse to deliver secure, multi-tenant data access across districts and states. She also highlights the challenges of adapting traditional BI tools for education use cases, including differences in school calendars, data privacy requirements, and complex user structures.
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EA Stack Series Part IV: Giving District Data a Platform with Podium with Katie O'Brien
Economists of Scale: Using Interoperability Technologies for Efficient Research with Large Datasets with Michael Christian and Sara Hu
January 28, 2026
In the latest episode of the DatabasED podcast, co-hosts Molly Stewart (Senior Product Manager) and Rosh Dhanawade (Vice President of Product) chat with Mike Christian, Principal Researcher, and Sara Hu, Research Scientist I, at Education Analytics. In this episode, Mike and Sara share how interoperability technologies are transforming research in the education sector. They also dive into their experiences using Ed-Fi data, Snowflake, SQL, and dbt documentation to conduct large-scale, efficient research at EA, along with the learning curve researchers face when moving from traditional flat files to modern data warehouses. This conversation highlights how bridging research, data engineering, and educational practice enables faster analysis, resulting in better outcomes for students and education stakeholders.
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Economists of Scale: Using Interoperability Technologies for Efficient Research with Large Datasets with Michael Christian and Sara Hu
LinkedIn Live Webinar: You've Modernized Your Data System—Now What? Turning Implementation Into Impact
April 21, 2026
What happens after Ed-Fi implementation? How do states turn modern education data systems into real, measurable impact?
This recorded LinkedIn Live conversation brings together Rosh Dhanawade, Vice President of Product at Education Analytics; Vijay Gollapudi, Chief Information Officer at the Tennessee Department of Education; and Sayeelakshmi Srinivasan, Technical Programs Manager at the Ed-Fi Alliance, and is moderated by Marlena Holden, Director of Brand and Communications at Education Analytics. They come together to explore what it takes to move beyond implementation and start driving results with data.
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LinkedIn Live Webinar: You've Modernized Your Data System—Now What? Turning Implementation Into Impact
Education Analytics Achieves ISO/IEC 27001 Certification, Completes SOC 2 Audit
January 14, 2026
Education Analytics (EA), a leading education non-profit dedicated to innovative research and technology solutions, announced it achieved ISO/IEC 27001 certification for the first time and successfully completed its Type 2 SOC 2 audit.
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Education Analytics Achieves ISO/IEC 27001 Certification, Completes SOC 2 Audit
