District of Columbia (DC) Public Schools
Student-level data collected by DCPS including grades and attendance data.
All students in DC Public Schools
Access
DC Public School data are available to those conducting research aligned with DCPS research priorities. DCPS does not allow use of its data in randomized evaluations in which students are denied services or that involve deceit of students. Research proposals and requests for data collection in DCPS schools and/or confidential data, including individual-level data, must be submitted to the Office of Data Systems & Strategy at [email protected]. The process and requirements for doing so are outlined in a guide. If the request is approved, the Office of Data Systems and Strategy will issue a Memorandum of Agreement and Confidentiality Agreement for the requestor to sign. The data will be issued via secure file transfer protocol (FTP) site. After the data has been used, the researcher must provide proposed publications and presentations using any findings from the data to DCPS at least 14 days prior to submission of manuscript or abstract for publication. In some instances, DCPS may require the right to approve publications or presentations.
Timeline for Access
All requests for confidential data, including new proposals, resubmissions, and continuing projects, are reviewed on a monthly basis in the order in which they are received. The guide for obtaining DCPS confidential data details each month’s submission due date and the estimate of when the proposal will be reviewed, which is about one week. DCPS recommends submitting proposals at least 90 days in advance of research commencement. For researchers seeking to conduct research during the current school year, DCPS recommends that research request proposals be submitted by the January submission date of the school year the latest.
Lag Time
Unknown.
Cost
Unknown.
Linking
DCPS does not specify a linking protocol in their public documentation; however, researchers have previously conducted evaluations at DCPS and matched administrative data to study data.
Identifiers Available for Linking
- Unknown.
Linking to Outside Data Sources
Unknown.
Data Contents
Partial List of Variables
Basic demographic information, attendance data, course grades, individual assignment grades.
J-PAL Randomized Evaluations Using this Data Set
Unknown.
Other Research Using this Data Set
Bergman, Peter and Todd Rogers. 2017."The Impact of Defaults on Technology Adoption, and its Underappreciation by Policymakers.” Faculty Research Working Paper Series.