Teachers Are Drowning in Data—And Still Waiting for Support

If you ask most teachers what they need right now, the answer is rarely more tests or another data spreadsheet. And yet, that’s exactly what keeps piling up.

Across classrooms, teachers are spending countless hours administering assessments, analyzing data, uploading results, and attending meetings about numbers—often with little to show for it when it comes to real support for students. The promise is always the same: this data will help. But for many educators, the help never arrives.

In our upcoming podcast episode, we’re taking a hard look at the growing frustration teachers feel around overtesting and excessive data collection. We’ll talk about how standardized assessments, benchmark tests, and constant progress monitoring have begun to overshadow the actual work of teaching—and how data is too often used for accountability rather than action.

Teachers aren’t anti-data. They know assessment has a place. What they’re tired of is data that:

• Doesn’t lead to additional resources or classroom support
• Takes time away from planning, instruction, and relationships
• Is collected repeatedly without clear purpose
• Is used to judge rather than to help

Most importantly, teachers are asking a simple question: If the data shows students need more support, where is it?

This episode is about elevating teacher voices, calling out systems that prioritize numbers over needs, and re-centering the conversation on what actually helps students succeed—time, trust, staffing, and meaningful intervention.

We Want to Hear From You

This conversation shouldn’t stop with us.

If you’re a teacher, educator, administrator, or support staff member, we want to know:

• What assessments are overwhelming your classroom or school?
• How has data collection impacted your workload?
• Where have you seen data fail to translate into support?
• What would meaningful support actually look like?

Send us your questions, concerns, and experiences ahead of the episode. Your insights may be featured on the podcast and will help shape the discussion.

Because teachers don’t need more data points—they need support that shows up where it matters most: in the classroom.

Stay tuned for Episode 52, coming this Monday at 3:01pm, after the bell.

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