How to Facilitate a Data Review That Produces Decisions, Not Discussion
May 12, 2027
This week’s pieces have covered what the May data review requires and how the combined outcome-and-budget format works. But format only matters if the meeting produces decisions. I’ve watched boards review the same data in the same format and produce completely different outcomes. The difference was facilitation.
A board that walks into the data review without a facilitation plan will have a wide-ranging conversation about student outcomes, budget variances, and superintendent performance. A board that walks in with a facilitation plan will review each goal, make recorded decisions, and adjourn with direction to the superintendent.
The difference is not the quality of the data. The difference is the meeting structure.
The preparation that happens before the meeting
The data review meeting itself is the visible part. The preparation that determines whether it produces decisions happens in the week before.
Five business days before the meeting, the superintendent provides the data packet. The packet contains: for each adopted goal, the student outcome data through the latest available period, the budget-to-actual report in the goal-alignment format, the trajectory comparison with the January baseline, and the February data review decisions for reference. Board members receive the packet with the agenda.
Three business days before the meeting, each board member completes a pre-meeting review. I recommend a simple form with three questions per goal: Based on the data, do I believe this goal is on track, off track, or uncertain? Based on the budget-to-actual data, do I believe the resource allocation is producing the expected results? What question do I want answered before the board makes a decision on this goal? The board president or data review facilitator collects the forms. They reveal where the board has consensus and where there are divergent views that need discussion.
One business day before the meeting, the board president or facilitator reviews the pre-meeting forms and structures the meeting agenda around the goals that need discussion. Goals with unanimous green assessments can be confirmed without discussion — the board minutes record the confirmation, and the meeting time goes to the goals where board members have questions or concerns.
This three-step preparation process sounds procedural. It is. That’s the point. A board that agrees to this process commits to being prepared. A board that arrives at the data review having seen the data, having formed preliminary views, and having communicated those views to the facilitator arrives ready to make decisions.
The meeting structure — ninety minutes, four sections
The data review meeting itself should be structured as a ninety-minute work session. I recommend this format:
| Time | Section | Purpose |
|---|---|---|
| 10 min | Opening and framing | The board president frames the purpose: the data review produces recorded decisions for each goal. The president reviews the February decisions and their outcomes. The president names which goals had unanimous pre-meeting green assessments — those are confirmed on consent in two minutes. |
| 40 min | Goal-by-goal review — yellow and green goals | Each goal with a yellow or red combined assessment gets reviewed followed by a decision. The review format per goal: (1) one-minute superintendent summary of the data, (2) five-minute board discussion focused on the combined assessment question — are the resources producing the trajectory? (3) two-minute decision — confirm, direct inquiry, direct adjustment, or schedule deeper review. The facilitator keeps each goal to eight minutes. |
| 25 min | Goal-by-goal review — red goals | Each red-combined-assessment goal gets a twelve-minute review. The format is the same but the board does not make a final decision during this meeting — it directs the deeper review structure. The board agrees on what additional information it needs, who prepares it, and the date of the deeper review meeting. |
| 15 min | Closeout and next steps | The facilitator reads each decision back for the record. The board confirms. The decisions are entered into the board minutes. The facilitator reviews the deeper review schedule for red goals. The board president connects the data review findings to the superintendent evaluation check-in scheduled for the following week. |
What to do when the data reveals a problem the board didn’t expect
This is the situation boards fear most. The data review reveals that a goal is further off track than the board knew. The combined assessment is red. And the board hasn’t prepared for this.
Here’s what I recommend when this happens. First, stay in the meeting structure. The data review is not the meeting for solving the problem — it’s the meeting for identifying what needs deeper review. The board directs the deeper review, sets the date, and specifies what information it needs.
Second, do not pressure the superintendent for an immediate solution. The superintendent needs time to analyze the situation. The board’s job is to identify what it doesn’t know and direct what additional information it requires.
Third, do not schedule the deeper review for the next regular board meeting. A red goal needs a dedicated meeting. Trying to fit a deeper review into a regular agenda — which already has consent items, public comment, superintendent report, and policy discussions — guarantees that the deeper review is rushed. Schedule a special meeting or a work session within thirty days.
Fourth, communicate with the board. The board president should inform the full board that a deeper review has been scheduled for a specific goal, what triggered it, and what the board expects to consider at the deeper review. Board members should not learn about the deeper review from the agenda or from community members who attended the data review.
How the decision protocol works in practice
I want to give you a concrete example of the decision protocol working well.
A board I coached had a math proficiency goal with a red combined assessment in May. The board did not panic. The data review followed the format — the facilitator kept the red goal review to twelve minutes. The board directed: the superintendent will prepare a deeper review packet covering intervention program participation rates, instructional coaching assignment by school, curriculum adoption timeline, and a budget reallocation analysis showing what resources could be redirected from lower-priority areas.
Two weeks later, the board conducted the deeper review in a two-hour work session. The board reviewed each element of the packet. The board discussed two options: redirect resources from a non-goal-aligned professional development line to math coaching, or maintain current allocation and adjust the trajectory target. The board made a recorded decision to redirect the professional development allocation to coaching and schedule a follow-up review for the July board meeting.
The board did not solve the math problem in one meeting. What the board did was identify the problem, gather the information, consider options, and make a direction. That’s the governance work. The superintendent then executes the direction, and the board monitors the result at the next data review.
That board enters the June superintendent evaluation with evidence of how it handled a difficult governance situation. The evaluation is stronger for it.
Your free CTA: Reply to this email with the keyword DecisionProtocol and I’ll send you the Data Review Facilitation Guide — a complete ninety-minute meeting script covering the pre-meeting preparation process, the board member pre-review form, the four-section meeting structure, the yellow-red-green decision protocol, and the deeper review scheduling template.
Your paid CTA: I offer a Data Review Facilitation Coaching Session — a ninety-minute planning call covering the combined outcome-and-budget review format, the board member preparation process, the decision recording system, and the deeper review escalation protocol. Reply to this email for pricing and availability.
This continues the May Governance to Impact arc: spring execution and fiscal year close. Monday’s piece introduced the combined review format. Wednesday’s piece covers the facilitation structure that turns data review into decision-making. Monday May 17’s piece shifts to the superintendent evaluation midpoint check-in — what the board should evaluate, how to structure the conversation, and how the data review findings feed into the evaluation. Subscribe at effectiveschoolboards.com to continue the series.
Backlinks: This piece is the operational companion to the May 5 and May 10 data review pieces. The three-step preparation process extends the board member preparation standard from the Jan 27 governance roadmap and the Apr 5 public hearing preparation checklist. The meeting structure follows the facilitation framework from the Apr 14 mid-year check-in piece. The deeper review escalation protocol builds on the variance threshold framework from the Apr 21 post-adoption budget monitoring piece. The math proficiency deeper review example connects to the budget alignment review methodology from the March arc.