WISEdash District Communications Support

WINSS transition support for September 15, 2015

WINSS retired as of September 15, 2015. Its data analysis topics are moving to either WISEdash Public or SDPR. This split ensures that your school data has an immediate home until the entire topic can migrate to WISEdash dashboards.

School district websites should change their WINSS links as of September 15 or soon after. 

Web content tips

• TIP 1 - how do I link to WISEdash? Use the short address:  http://wisedash.dpi.wi.gov  
• TIP 2 - what was the old WINSS address? To search for broken links, search for the text "data.dpi.state.wi.us", the former URL of the WINSS data. Also search for "WINNS" as it was often misspelled.
• TIP 3 - link directly to your district's data. Your district can LINK DIRECTLY to its own data in WISEdash Public by using the  link icon at the TOP of any WISEdash dashboard.

Which data portal has my topic?

• WINSS to WISEdash: Enrollment, Enrollment by Primary Disability, Attendance, WSAS, ACT, AP Exams, High School Completion, Dropout 
• WINSS to SDPR: Retention, Post-graduation Plans, Habitual Truancy, School-Sponsored Community Activities, Extra-/Co-Curricular Activities, Graduation Requirements, Discipline, Staff, Finance Note:  All topics are available through the WISEdash Public Portal top menu.
• Check the A-Z index for more detailed data topic links
• To see contents of dashboards, try the WISEdash Data Map

Digest of WISEdash communications to districts

WISEdash badges and graphics

Use the BADGE CODE to directly add a WISEdash icon with the application link to your website. NOTE: Download the icon to your local drive if required.

Background and general uses	Badge graphic	Size	BADGE CODE: Copy and paste the code in your HTML source code to insert a WISEdash badge with link
Transparent background for websites		24x114px.PNG	<a href="http://wisedash.dpi.wi.gov" target="_new"><img src="https://dpi.wi.gov/sites/default/files/imce/wisedash/images/badge_24.png" height="22" width="114" border="0"></a>
Transparent background for websites		24x240px.PNG	<a href="http://wisedash.dpi.wi.gov" target="_new"><img src="https://dpi.wi.gov/sites/default/files/imce/wisedash/images/badge_24www.png" height="24" width="240" border="0"></a>
White button background for websites		28x126px.GIF	<a href="http://wisedash.dpi.wi.gov" target="_new"><img src="https://dpi.wi.gov/sites/default/files/imce/wisedash/images/badge_24_whitebutton.png" height="28" width="126" border="0"></a>
Transparent background for websites		56x205px.PNG	<a href="http://wisedash.dpi.wi.gov" target="_new"><img src="https://dpi.wi.gov/sites/default/files/imce/wisedash/images/badge_50.png" height="56" width="205" border="0"></a>
PowerPoint banner and blank presentation		.pptx	Link to PowerPoint banner
WISEdash screenshot		1129x839px .jpg	Link to full-size WISEdash screenshot

Background information for school district staff and administrators

Q.  What is the difference between WISEdash for Districts and the WISEdash Public Portal ?

Overall, these two tools are meant to be used as companion tools.  We suggest using the public version of WISEdash as your landing page and the first stop for data and information made available by DPI.  When you are ready to do more analysis at the cohort or student level, jump to Secure Home icon in the footer to log into the secure district data. More information on the differences is listed below.

WISEdash for Districts

WISEdash for Districts should be used if you are in a public school district, school, or DPI staff and have a legitimate educational need to access non-redacted summary and/or student-level data for data retreats, or if you will be analyzing the data to improve student outcomes. 

• to perform school improvement planning (SIP) work
• if you need to drill deeper into graphs and reports to build cohorts of students or to identify the specific students included in a reported value
• to view specific student’s historical results when other sources are not yet available
• to compare a specific student’s growth results to his/her peers

WISEdash for Districts Secure Home URL is  https://apps2.dpi.wi.gov/secure/

• How to get access:  DPI's Secure Home Information Page for Districts
• Tools available for Districts through Secure Home today include:  WISEdash, WISEid, WISEstaff, ASM, SAFE, IEP PTP, School Directory, and SPR.

WISEdash Public Portal

DPI released a public version of WISEdash in October 2013.  It does not contain student data. WISEdash is a data portal that uses "dashboards," or visual collections of graphs and tables, to provide multi-year educational data about Wisconsin schools.  As a public reporting tool, WISEdash will be used by districts, schools, parents, researchers, media, and other community members to view data published by DPI.

WISEdash Public Portal URL will be http://wisedash.dpi.wi.gov

FAQ

What's in WISEdash? Every year, all Wisconsin school districts collect information about their students, staff, and courses. These data sets are submitted to the Department of Public Instruction where they're stored in a data warehouse, a repository of millions of educational records that are linked and organized by school year. WISEdash gives you an interactive way to select and filter Wisconsin school data from the 2005-06 school year forward. Data are published by the Department of Public Instruction, and are redacted to protect student privacy. Additional historical datasets from 1998 forward can be downloaded. Links to other educational datasets and key reports are available in WISEdash.

Who should use WISEdash public version? The WISEdash public portal is the front door for parents and community members to discover all types of data about Wisconsin schools and districts. Educators should send parents and community members to WISEdash for public data reports.  WISEdash can also be used to compare districts, schools, and statewide data. Educators and school staff should use the secure version of WISEdash for student-level analysis.

Why is WISEdash important? Education data is a primary tool to see how our students, schools, and policies are working. Over time, the data show the results of changes we make in schools, letting us track progress and make adjustments. As stated in Agenda 2017, the goal for Wisconsin is to help ensure every child graduates from high school prepared for both college and career pathways. WISEdash is a key part of Agenda 2017's assessment and data systems emphasis on giving parents and the public more timely, quality data to use for informed decision-making. 

Q.  I am comparing publicly available data from the WISEdash Public Portal to data available through WISEdash for Districts but the data (counts and percentages) are not matching up.  Can you explain why?

You may find it beneficial to use both tools (see “When does it make sense to use the WISEdash Public Portal vs. WISEdash for Districts?” below). However, you should not expect the counts and percentages to exactly match up.

Here are reasons why.

• Since it is a public reporting tool, data in the WISEdash Public Portal is redacted to protect the privacy of students.  More information on redaction can be found on the WISEdash Redaction Information page.
• The WISEdash Public Portal includes two different data views while WISEdash for Districts provides one data view.
  • It is important to note that the Current Data View for the WISEdash Public Portal will present data in the same way as WISEdash for Districts.
  • More information on certified vs. current views can be found  the WISEdash Data Views page.  
• The WISEdash Public Portal removes certain student records for public reporting purposes that are not removed from the data displayed in WISEdash for Districts. These students include those students parentally placed in a private school receiving services at the district and students that have “aged out”.
• Enrollment Data:  The WISEdash Public Portal reports enrollment results through the Certified Data View as of the 3rd Friday of September as reported on the ISES Count Date data collection.  The Current Data View provides a look at 3rd Friday of September Enrollment based on WSLS combined with ISES Year End to give the public an approximate look at Enrollment counts before the Certified Data View is available via the ISES Count Date data collection. WISEdash for Districts also bases enrollment on WSLS combined with ISES Year End.  It reports enrollment in several ways and as of different points in time including 3rd Friday of September and 2nd Friday in January counts.  ISES Count Date and ISES Year End collections are submitted a year apart and can have significant differences.

Q.  When does it make sense to use the WISEdash Public Portal vs. WISEdash for Districts?

As a public reporting tool, the WISEdash Public Portal will be used by districts, schools, parents, researchers, media, and other community members  to view data published by DPI.  WISEdash for Districts should be used if you are in a public school district and have a legitimate educational need to access non-redacted summary and/or student-level data for data retreats, or if you will be analyzing the data to improve student outcomes.   

The WISEdash Public Portal should be used:

• if you are planning to show data to certain groups where summary and redacted data is appropriate

• if you need to link to publicly-reported data from DPI on your district or school website

• if you need to send data (or a link to data) to someone who is requesting the data

• if you are looking for data topics that have not yet transitioned to WISEdash

WISEdash for Districts should be used:

• if you need to drill deeper into graphs and reports to identify the specific students included in a reported value
• to view specific student’s historical results when other sources are not yet available
• to compare a specific student’s WKCE growth results to his/her peers
• if you are looking for data not available publicly such as Student Growth, ACCESS for ELLs results and Postsecondary Enrollments.