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Portsmouth district unveils unified student-data platform to flag attendance and academic risk in real time
Summary
The Portsmouth School Committee heard a detailed presentation from data manager Beth Farley on a new district data platform intended to consolidate academic, attendance and behavioral data into real‑time dashboards and an automated MTSS diagnostic matrix; committee members raised questions about data accuracy, privacy and the parent portal rollout.
Beth Farley, the district data manager, presented a rollout plan June 9 for a consolidated student-data platform intended to replace isolated spreadsheets and create a single dashboard for academics, attendance, conduct and interventions. "We are moving away from just collecting that information to creating a system where data drives immediate unified action," Farley said, describing automated dashboards and an MTSS diagnostic matrix that flags students at risk and surfaces cohort- and student-level views.
Farley told the committee the platform pulls overnight data from existing sources (including Renaissance/Star) and that she has built cohort views, an intervention funnel, and a 360-degree student profile to support progress-monitoring and parent-teacher conferences. She said some cleanup is required when testing data are duplicated and that typical fixes are resolved within about 24 hours.
Committee members raised privacy and access concerns. Farley said district administrators and a limited set of staff will have broader access while teachers will be restricted to the students they serve: "I am able to put the restrictions on so that teachers can only see the students that they're servicing," she said. The committee discussed whether contact information or broader parent-access features should be included in the parent portal; Farley said the parent portal rollout and specific access settings remain a district decision.
Superintendent and school leaders described practical use cases: Dr. Masterson said, during an IEP meeting, he could pull live grades and assessment data and share that view with families to make immediate, evidence-based adjustments. The platform’s proponents told the committee they expect the new workflow to reduce time spent pulling disparate data in meetings and better align interventions with current evidence.
The presentation prompted operational follow-ups rather than a vote; questions for future work include finalizing access permissions, the timeline for a parent portal, and how SEAL tracking and standards-based grading will be integrated as the district scales the system to elementary and high school campuses.
