Agenda Text
title
Requesting an appropriation of $165,000 from Unreserved Fund Balance ("Free Cash") to the School Dept. Curriculum District-Wide Other Instructional Services Account to provide partial funding for the development of an Integrated Data System.
body
Official Text
To the Honorable Board:
I respectfully request an appropriation of $165,000 from Unreserved Fund Balance ("Free Cash") to the School Department, Curriculum District -Wide, Other Instructional Services Account (SO331991-530100) to provide partial funding for the development of an Integrated Data System. (IDS).
I am very pleased to inform the Board of Aldermen that the City of Somerville is one of eight cities nationally selected for the prestigious 2015 Code for America Fellowship, and via the Fellowship, civic technology developers will work with the Somerville Public Schools to develop an Integrated Data System (IDS) that will bring significant and critical new capabilities to the school’s ability to improve educational and life outcomes for our students. The project builds upon an existing multi-year partnership between Tufts University and the City of Somerville that requires development of the IDS to move forward in the partnership’s efforts to improve educational services via data-based information systems. The compelling need and the quality of the IDS project has already garnered the support of The Boston Foundation, which has committed funding for the IDS, as well as from the Commonwealth and Microsoft New England, which have each committed both financial and intensive project support. With the Board’s support of this matching fund request, we will be able to carry out this important work.
The IDS will provide a longitudinal, integrated data system that tracks children’s risk/protective factors, life transitions, and consumption of agency services, both inside and outside of school thus giving decision makers and educators at different levels greater access to data about children and youth to achieve the following desired outcomes among others:
real-time, data-based interventions for better educational outcomes,
longitudinal analysis and cost-benefit analysis of educational initiatives and interventions,
legibility of 0-k data to allow for early intervention that can greatly improve life outcomes and create significant savings for the school system.
To this end, on behalf of the School Department, I am respectfully requesting $165,000 of the $470,000 project budget to complete funding provided by The Boston Foundation ($110,000), the Massachusetts Office of Information Technology ($110,000), Microsoft New England ($35,000), and SomerPromise ($50,000). The budget includes $440,000 for development services and $30,000 for a project lead.
Respectfully,
Joseph A. Curtatone
Mayor