Data Lead

Tyler joined the Read Charlotte Team in September 2018 as a Data Subject Matter Expert. He joined Read Charlotte as a part of the Education Pioneers Impact Fellowship. Previously he served as an Assistant Vice President Software Developer at Citibank. There he worked with the Credit Technology team to develop and maintain reports. Specifically, he worked with traders, business unit managers and senior leaders to gather requirements, ensure data quality and create customized views based on stakeholder needs. He received his bachelor’s degree from the University of Richmond in 2015 where he majored in Computer Science and Mathematical Economics. His favorite childhood books are the Matt Christopher sports series.

What do you wish you knew from the beginning?

During this initiative we started with a general idea to use common assessment data on the Reading Success Pathway Skills to improve student language and literacy outcomes. Over time we developed our model, identifying specific Knowledge, Skills, Mindsets and Routines to accomplish our Aim. This focus has allowed us to be more targeted and effective in our training, coaching sessions, tools and technical assistance.

If there is one piece I would have loved to have known from the start, it would be having our model from the beginning. I hope that people continue this work, and specifically I hope they take the work we have done in developing the model as opposed to starting from the beginning.

What body of work are you most proud of? Why?

I am most proud of the work I have done toward building tools to help our Partners engage with data including DataFit and Student Outcome Reports. My goal for these tools was to make the data actionable, to present views that were meaningful to Partners, and show how student outcome data relates to the model and routines. In seeing Partners interact with these tools, I got to see Partners who carried around marked up versions of the Student Outcome Reports in their bag, and Partners who changed how they set goals to reflect the growth by student profile in the fall view in the Student Outcome Reports.

One of the accomplishments of the Data Collaborative I am most proud of is helping Partners to be more comfortable with data and see it as useful for more than just reporting and accountability. I am proud of the tools we built, because I believe they played a role in helping our Partners to become more comfortable using data to take action.

Where would you push the work if the project was going to continue? Why?

If the project continues, my biggest suggestion would be to adopt more built out evidence based practices such as developed curriculum. I believe we have made significant strides in building up the Knowledge, Skills, and Mindsets of our Partners. I also think we have been able to successfully support Partners in completing the routines in our model. A piece that is missing in my view is evidence-based practices that are well suited for our Partners to implement.

In years one and two we focused our work around the Evidence-Based Practices 2.0 pillar around Explicit Instruction training. While I am confident that teaching Reading Success Pathway skills with Explicit Instruction will yield positive results, training frontline staff to develop and deliver Explicit Instruction lessons on their own is a high bar. In year 3 we have focussed on Vocabulary developing an Explicit Instruction Vocabulary Lesson plan for frontline staff to use. I think this was a step in the right direction, but still we saw that staff had trouble finding the time to write out these lesson plans on their own.

I believe by adopting more built out evidence-based practices we could lighten the load on staff having to spend time building out their lessons and allow them to focus more energy on implementing an established practice with fidelity. One example of such an approach is the Ready to Read initiative’s use of the Read it Once Again Curriculum. Another example of a built out evidence-based practice that could be used is HELPS Tutoring.

What do you recommend when there’s resistance from Participants in adopting the work?

I would say the key to overcoming initial resistance is to build trust. One of the things Deepti did an amazing job of in the first year was building trust with our Partners. She did this by continuing to show up, making it clear to Partners that she was there to support them and not to say “gotcha” or make them feel bad about things they weren’t doing yet. As a team we have tried to keep this momentum going. One strategy we have used is being willing to be silly in front of Partners, not trying to project the image that we are perfect or have it all together. Another strategy we have used is trying to make the Knowledge, Skills, and Mindsets accessible by presenting them in different ways. We used themes like basketball to teach implementation, or a game of hot and cold to show the value of data. The idea here being that as Partners see and understand the value in the work we are asking them to do there will be less resistance.