Basic data — Descriptive statistics

Basic data are those items collected for NCES by the States from the Local Education Agencies based on their administrative records. Extensive criticism and suggestion are offered for both categories of data: the universe descriptor data on timeliness and comparability grounds; the finance data as being too skeletal in nature, even to the point of challenging their collection for having so little informational content. The two fundamental concerns are (a) quality: continued inaccuracies in State and thus national data overwhelm all other concerns; and (b) comparability of State data to enable educators and the public to monitor educational achievements against a standard.