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Student Data Workshop

A facilitation guide for taking a finished listening report and turning it into a student-built presentation for educators, school boards, and policymakers.

co-analysis session guide

the workshop at a glance

1 · read the report

About 30 minutes. Students read their school's published report and react to it: what rings true, what surprises them, what's missing.

2 · decide what to amplify

About 30 minutes. The group picks the two or three findings they most want adults to hear, and the quotes that carry them.

3 · build and rehearse

An hour or more. Students build a presentation from one of the templates below and rehearse the conversation that follows it.

before the workshop

get students into the report

  • Participating students need facilitator access, granted on the Roster in Polaris. The co-analysis guide walks through it.
  • Share the report's direct link with the group. Facilitator students open it from the link, and quotes play their audio right in the page.
  • No Polaris at your school? Print the report or project it. The workshop works the same way.

book the audience first

  • Pick the real audience and date before the workshop: a staff PD block, a school board meeting, or a district or policy conversation.
  • The audience decides the template, the length, and the tone. Ensure students understand this work is for a real audience.
  • Running the co-analysis session first is ideal but not required. Students who built the themes present them with much more confidence.

run the workshop

read the report

  • Point students at the sections that reward reading: Key Voices, Themes, Strengths, Challenges, and Actions.
  • Have them read with three questions in hand:
"What here rings true to your experience?" "What surprises you?" "What's missing that students actually talk about?"

decide what to amplify

  • List possible findings on the board, then dot-vote: each student gets three votes for "adults need to hear this."
  • A finding makes the cut when it has a strong quote, it's actionable, and it matters to this audience. Two or three findings beat ten.
  • With Polaris, a Sensemaking board works for this too: play the candidate quotes onto the table and stack them under the findings they support.

build the presentation

  • Pick the template below that matches the booked audience, and split slides across the team so everyone speaks.
  • Quotes are the major deliverable. Adults remember one real student sentence longer than any chart. Read quotes slowly, and let them land.
  • Students speak for the data, not for themselves. "Students said" beats "I think" in every room.
  • Practice at least once in front of someone who hasn't seen the material, and practice the discussion questions, not just the slides.

presentation templates

10-minute pd opener

For educators, at the top of a staff meeting or PD block.

  1. Who we are. Students introduce themselves and what the listening project is. (1 min)
  2. How the data was gathered. Small group conversations, recorded and anonymized. (1 min)
  3. Three themes, each with one read-aloud quote. (5 min)
  4. What surprised us as students reading it. (1 min)
  5. One ask: something teachers could try in class this month. (1 min)
  6. Table talk: leave one discussion question on screen. (1 min, then hand off)

5-minute board update

For a school board meeting. Tight, numbers first, one page of slides.

  1. What happened. "This year, ___ students took part in ___ small group conversations about our school." (30 sec)
  2. Two themes, one quote each. Pick the quotes that stand on their own. (2 min)
  3. What students recommend, in students' own words. (1 min)
  4. The ask: the one decision or resource this board can act on. (30 sec)
  5. Where to read more. Leave the report with the clerk, thank the board. (30 sec)

policy deep dive

20 to 30 minutes, for district leadership or policy audiences.

  1. Context and method. Who was heard, how, and how privacy is protected. (3 min)
  2. Themes in depth. Each theme gets several quotes and the pattern behind them. (10 min)
  3. The research connection. Tie themes to the report's Research section, so the ask is backed by more than one story. (5 min)
  4. Student recommendations, with what each one would take to put in place. (5 min)
  5. Questions and commitments. Close by asking for a named next step, not applause. (5 min)

the conversation after

questions students ask adults

"Which of these themes matches what you already see? Which doesn't?" "What's one thing you could change this semester?" "What would you need to hear more about before acting on this?" "Who else needs to see this?"

questions adults ask students

"What was it like to read your peers' words?" "What did we get wrong in how we run things, based on what you read?" "If we act on one theme first, which should it be and why?"

the room doesn't end at "thanks for sharing"

  • Before anyone leaves, each adult names one concrete follow-up: a thing they will try, change, or bring to someone who can.
  • Write the follow-ups down and set a date to report back to the students who presented. Being heard means hearing what happened next.