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Evidence-driven strategic planning

School-wide approaches are important considerations for schools looking to evidence-driven practices. 

If we use evidence-driven decision making to improve student achievement and enhance teaching practice, it follows that strategic planning across the school should also be evidence-driven.

The accompanying diagram indicates one way to think of evidence-driven strategic planning.

In this model, data from a range of sources provide "indicators" of a problem. One aspect of student achievement stands out across the school as an area that could be improved. In this case it is writing.

This leads the board to establish a strategic goal. They then add an appropriate aim and a target (with measurable outcomes) to the school’s annual plan.

School leaders then create a development plan. To do this they need to go back to the indicator data and analyse these data alongside other data and evidence. Then the development plan is implemented.

At the end of the year, other data and evidence are analysed to evaluate the success of the development plan as a whole and the various strategies that were used. The data used for evaluation will probably be different from those used to identify the problem and develop the action plan. In this case, the current NCEA results were not relevant for year 9 students, and other data was collected to evaluate some of the actions taken.

Other examples:

This multi-faceted approach to looking at evidence-based strategic planning for the whole school was developed by Colleen Douglas, School Support Services, Massey University.

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