Data, Dyads, and Dynamics: Exploring Data Use and Social Networks in Educational Improvement

Background: In the past decade, there has been an increasing national policy push for educators to systematically collect, interpret, and use data for instructional decision making. The assumption by the federal government is that having data systems will be enough to prompt the use of data for a wide range of decision making. These policies rely on inducements to inspire local level changes; however, they leave the processes related to data use largely undefined. Objective: In this article, I argue that many of the studies on data use either invoke or directly assess network-related concepts and, as such, network theory and analysis provides a useful analytic and complementary framework and methods for examining the social infrastructure in the use of data for educational improvement. Research Design: This article reports on a literature review of the data use and social network literatures and the utility of intersecting both literatures for studies on data use for educational improvement. Conclusions: Many data use studies report that the interpretation and use of data takes place both within and between individuals who, through social interaction, are both co-constructing and making sense of data and their use. Given the increasing role of social relationships in data use studies better theorizing and understanding the dynamics of social influence and processes on the interpretation and use of data is needed. Social network theory and analysis offers a useful conceptual framework and accompanying methods for describing and analyzing the structure of a social system in an effort to understand how social relationships support and constrain the interpretation and use of data in educational improvement.