Equity Audits as a Tool of Critical Data-Driven Decision Making: Preparing Teachers to See Beyond Achievement Gaps and Bubbles

Abstract

As schools and teachers utilize data-driven decision-making processes to identify and remediate struggling students, systemic conditions that contribute to students’ learning opportunities are often ignored. This longitudinal mixed-methods study examines the use of an equity audit as a critical data-driven decision-making tool in a graduate course for teachers on educational change. Findings indicate that through engagement in the equity audit process, teachers experienced increases in understanding of and skill with data, enhanced awareness of in/equity, and a greater sense of change agency. Interviews with participants one year later revealed the complexity in sustaining action related to equity in schools. Although findings suggest that teacher engagement with broader types of data with an explicit focus on equity in a university graduate program has the potential to reskill and empower teachers to address school-based opportunity gaps, support is needed beyond the university to maintain initial commitment and facilitate action.

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