Raw Data from States

Good morning and thanks for reading. This week we’re out collecting more data, so look for next week’s newsletter to highlight the next wave of data from early January. 

In the meantime, we wanted to bring to your attention a new feature of the dashboard: aggregating public state data in a (slightly) more usable form.

Background

Our main dashboard includes data from two large states, New York and Texas, which report out information on COVID cases and in person school information. 

However, these are not the only states which report data on COVID cases in schools; many states report out in some form.  The form varies.  To give some examples:

• Massachusetts reports cases by school district in each week, separated by students and staff.

• West Virginia reports outbreaks in schools, but not single cases. An outbreak is defined as 2 or more cases plausibly linked by a school contact (i.e. in the same classroom, or group).

• New Hampshire reports both individual cases and clusters of 3 or more. 

There is relatively little consistency in these reports and outside of New York and Texas other states do not report information on in-person numbers which would allow us to include their data in the overall dashboard. However: we have been accessing these data since the fall, and thought it would be of value to make them easily downloadable.

Access the Data

The third tab on our dashboard, accessible here, links to raw state data.  Please note: these data do not include any data provided to use by districts or schools under our commitment to confidentiality.  We provide only publicly posted state data.

In each case, we’ve aggregated the data into a spreadsheet.  Our hope is that this will make it easier for people to explore, to see what their state is producing and to see what things have looked like over time. 

More eyes on the data, more data analysis, is always welcome.  So let us know what you find!  And if you think we’re missing your state, or there’s data we do not have, send us an email at covidschooldashboard@gmail.com.