Emis Development argumentative essay help online Sociology assignment help

However, how to maximize student learning in educational systems with limited resources remains one of the greatest educational challenges. This requires a constant monitoring and evaluation of the learning system in education by collecting and examining data and information used in the process of educational decision making. Information-based decision making in the management of the education system has as its goal increased access, efficiency, effectiveness, equity, and quality of education through effective systems of monitoring and evaluation, budgeting and planning, policy research and analysis.

Education management information systems (EMIS) enable these informed decisions to be made by providing necessary data and information and by fostering an environment in which the demand for this information drives its use. Integrated data and information systems are at the very core of EMIS development in their support of the educational management functions throughout the education system. The production of educational data and information is a critical cornerstone on which this information-based decision-making framework is built.

Deficiencies or inadequacies in its availability, utility, or quality have far-reaching implications. This article will examine the production and use of education information in the EMIS framework. 2. Managing Education System Data & Information (EMIS Development Framework) “Perhaps for the first time in history, humankind has the capacity to create far more information than anyone can absorb, to foster greater interdependency than anyone can manage, and to accelerate change faster than anyone’s ability to keep pace. (Peter Senge 1990)i An EMIS is designed to manage this wealth of information in the education system and put it to use to enact meaningful changes in education, while highlighting the interdependencies that exist within different elements of the education system, as well as between education and other aspects of society. 2. 1 Definition of EMIS An EMIS is an institutional service unit producing, managing, and disseminating educational data and information, usually within a national Ministry or Department of Education.

The management functions of EMIS include collecting, storing, integrating, processing, organizing, outputting, and marketing educational data and statistics in a timely and reliable fashion. These specific tasks serve the needs of educational management, resource allocation, and policy formulation, such as planning and budgeting, policy research and analysis, monitoring and evaluation, allocating school supplies, and domestic and global communication and collaboration.

Page 4 of 26 EMIS and Their Implications in Educational Management Hua and Herstein An EMIS is also a set of formalized and integrated operational processes, procedures, and cooperative agreements by which data and information about schools and schooling, such as facilities, teachers, students, learning activities, and evaluative outputs, are regularly shared, integrated, analyzed, and disseminated for educational decision use at each level of the educational hierarchy.

Lastly, EMIS is an institutional culture that perpetually advocates data and information use and seeks to ensure it through the creation of an environment which permits information systems to flourish (requiring institutional and organizational commitments), while creating and sustaining demand for information products. 2. 2 Three Key Measures of EMIS Success An EMIS’s success depends upon three factors: • • • 2. 2. 1 Timely and Reliable Production of Data and Information

Data Integration and Data Sharing among Departments Effective Use of Data and Information for Educational Policy Decisions Timely and Reliable Production of Data and Information Timely production of data and information requires that there be a shared understanding of the following by all potential data and information producers, users, or clients: 1) EMIS data produced regularly must meet the needs of overall educational planning and budgeting cycle. 2)

EMIS data produced regularly must meet the needs of educational services, such as the Logistics Unit and other units of school supplies. 3) EMIS data produced regularly must meet the needs of educational monitoring and evaluation, and policy research and guidance in a timely fashion. 4) EMIS data produced regularly must meet the needs of international collaboration and communication. The timeliness of meeting these needs within the Ministry of Education is critically important for the success of EMIS development.

Obsolete data, even after produced, may not have much value for use, resulting in missed intervention opportunities and a pervasive distrust from information clients within or outside the organization. To guarantee timely production of data and information to meet these needs, the process of data collection, data entry, data processing, data integration, data analysis, and data reporting should be short, efficient, and productive. This can be often achieved by increasing the level of effort, beginning preparations earlier, proposing and reinforcing

Page 5 of 26 EMIS and Their Implications in Educational Management Hua and Herstein task deadlines, institutionalizing EMIS as a routine management process, and strengthening the coordinating capacity of EMIS data-related activities. The reliable production of data suggests that EMIS data, once produced, must reliably report a “current reality or status” or “trend of change” of educational development of the country, district, or school.

It means that policy makers, planners, budget makers, field educational officers, principals, teachers, parents, and students can trust the data and data sources. To win such a trust, data collection must be treated as a scientific process of fact finding. Variables must be indicative, meaningfully measuring certain elements of the educational system or sub-systems. Regardless of whether data collection is routine or ad hoc, data collectors must be well-trained and prepared to follow scientifically rigid steps.

They should not be left with much flexibility in interpretation of methodology or with freedom to change the course of data collection. The level of data reliability can be affected by almost all elements of data and information production procedures, which include the design of data collection instruments, clarity of question items, field data collection methods, educational and ethical level of respondents, design of computer database applications, data entry procedures, data aggregation methods, data integration procedures, and analytical and data processing capacity.

To boost the reliability of data, the overall design of the data collection process, data instrument development, and design and development of computer database application must be carefully crafted. No amount of technological innovation can enhance data and information that is of poor quality from the outset. The maxim “garbage in, garbage out” is as true in data and information management as it is in computer programming. Both timeliness and reliability can affect the level of information user confidence and trust in the data.

Delay in data production and/or production of unreliable data can easily lead to lack of data use and management frustration, resulting in ineffective planning and budgeting, monitoring and evaluation, policy analysis, and policy-making. When data and information users (e. g. , policy makers, analysts) lose faith in EMIS’s ability or credibility, they often discourage support for maintaining, strengthening, and upgrading the EMIS system. In turn, data and information production capacity becomes even worsened or diminished, further jeopardizing the ability to produce timely and reliable data.

This vicious cycle that permeates some educational systems must be eradicated. A healthy culture of information-based decision-making and management, enabled and supported by an information-user-demand-driven EMIS, must be nurtured and developed. 2. 2. 2 Data Integration and Data Sharing among Departments Data integration is one of the most important EMIS development strategies. It means that data from multiple sources (payroll, achievement, school census), multiple years, and multiple levels (student, teacher, or school level) can e linked, integrated, or merged. Data integration is intended to add value to the data that are already collected and available in variously scattered places within the same system. Data integration is a must occur before an educational policy analyst or planner can conduct a high-level and highquality policy analysis or planning exercise. It is common to see multiple units within a Ministry of Education collect and manage large databases and not share them with each Page 6 of 26 EMIS and Their Implications in Educational Management

Hua and Herstein other. These various sets of data are collected to describe certain elements of the system. For example, in a Ministry of Education, data on student achievement are often collected, managed, and available at an examination unit; data on teacher qualification and salary are at a payroll office; data on enrollment and school inputs are at a statistics unit, and data on supplies of textbooks, classroom hardware, and other teaching resources are often at a supply office.

These offices often have separate databases for their own task planning and management and they rarely share them with other offices. These multiple sets of data are often designed in varying database applications, organized in different platforms, and coded with self-developed identification code. As a result, the data cannot readily be integrated or used integratively unless a data integration strategy is implemented. Without coordinated management, there cannot be a monitoring and evaluation system, a planning and policy analysis system, or an EMIS system that is effective and policy-relevant.

Without such systems, there would be no answers to policy inquiries such as: How much do teacher qualification and salary contribute to student learning achievement, given that the school environment and resource allocation are identical? What is the impact of a new teacher-training program or a new curriculum (or any new educational investment project) on student learning achievement? Clearly, we must integrate the data from multiple sources so that we can conduct the right data analysis to answer the right policy questions.

Multi-level data from multiple sources and years, once centrally integrated and organized, could have a tremendous value for policyrelevant research and analysis and improvement in education management. 2. 2. 3 Effective Use of Data & Information for Policy Decisions One of the most critical factors that contributes to the success of the EMIS development is an institutional culture of making policy decisions based on data and information. This culture is a user-demand-enabling environment under which the policy research and analysis capacity can be built, strengthened, and further developed.

Policy makers, planners, policy analysts, and other high stakeholders are the users of the data and information. The demand for using data and information should stimulate and nurture the healthy development of an information-based decision-making culture and the EMIS system. Often, the institutional demand for use of data and information is translated into or demonstrated by the capacity of the Monitoring and Evaluation Unit, Policy Research and Analysis Unit, and Budgeting and Planning Unit within the Ministry. A weak capacity in any of these management units would exert a negative impact on EMIS development.

EMIS activities can often be misconstrued as information technology (IT) activities. It should be noted that IT efforts represent the technical elements of a larger information management capacity. IT development will not automatically bring about healthy data flow, data sharing, information production, or information use for policy decisions. Some people even firmly believe that the “productivity” can be significantly improved and organizational “business benefits” can be extensively materialized once IT is introduced.

This perception gets exacerbated as people work farther away from the central level (such as district offices) or in lower management positions. This perception is not correct. Page 7 of 26 EMIS and Their Implications in Educational Management Hua and Herstein EMIS development should concentrate on data and information use and institutional behavior change for modern management. Even without IT, there should be a system or culture of data and information use for management. An IT development should be designed to provide a technical enhancement to facilitate the capacity of data and information production and use.