Indicators of Distress is an early detection system that helps you identify school qualities, data trends, and patterns that inform plans to prevent school decline.
We analyze data from your state or district to determine what is working and address what needs improvement. Our expertise in practice, research, and evaluation also increase your capacity for data-informed allocation of resources.
How We Help
Indicators of Distress helps you bridge the gap between accountability and school improvement with a research-based approach. We help you support students more equitably by identifying and understanding schools experiencing distress long before a state accountability grade designates a school as “failing.”
Our team draws on WestEd’s Four Domains for Rapid School Improvement: A Systems Framework. This framework identifies four areas—turnaround leadership, talent development, instructional transformation, and culture shift—that research and experience demonstrate are central to a rapid and significant improvement to pull a school out of failure. We work to identify the contextual challenges to schools that may support or impede progress: governance, operations, and financial systems and processes.
Service Delivery
- Online and onsite
Who Will Benefit
- District and/or local educational agency administrators
- School improvement specialists
- State educational agency administrators
We needed a way to maximize our limited resources, both human and financial. We wanted to identify those schools where the engine light is on, and with some intervention and support, they could turn things around and catch them well before they identify for CSI or TSI and require more intensive support.
— John Carwell
Delaware Department of Education
Featured Experts
Aimee Evan
Kelly Wynveen
William Berry
Connecting Research With Practice
Our approach is grounded in research on early warning system methodology. This methodology identifies patterns and characteristics from previous events that led to failure or crisis, tests those patterns to identify specific risk indicators and thresholds, and then uses the characteristics systematically to predict risk and efficiently tailor interventions (Allensworth & Easton, 2005; Allensworth & Easton, 2007; Balfanz, Herzog, & Mac Iver, 2007; Neild & Balfanz, 2006; Silver, Saunders, & Zarate, 2008).
Guided by evidence, our team provides rigorous data analysis, self-diagnostic tools, and coaching to help you sustain high-quality teaching and learning experiences for years to come.
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