New Virginia Department of Education Website Communicates Quality of Schools

As states are busy submitting their response to the new regulations set by the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), the Virginia Department of Education (VDOE) worked with AIS Network (AISN) to develop a website that captures report card data and puts it into context that is meaningful and useful for parents, students and the general public.

State report cards are one component of the No Child Left Behind Act that carried over when President Obama signed ESSA in December 2015. But a recent report from the Data Quality Campaign — which reviewed report cards from all 50 states and the District of Columbia — found that only a handful of report cards are new, while others are inadequate. The nonprofit concluded that finding and interpreting state report cards can be confusing since information is scattered across many websites, some of which are outdated by a few years.

VDOE’s new School Quality Profiles site serves as an online data tool that clearly communicates the status of achievements of Virginia’s public schools, including “reports on gifted education programs, average class sizes and statistically valid surveys of students, teachers and other school employees on the learning environment,” according to a news release.

AISN, a high compliance and secure IT managed services expert serving the Commonwealth of Virginia and large enterprises, answered the 2015 General Assembly’s call to redesign online reports, according to the news release. The company created a site that can be assessed by mobile device. It is “Section 508 compliant, satisfies all the Virginia State IT Accessibility Requirements and Virginia.gov State Website Standards, and meets ADA Standards for Accessible Design,” the release said.

In a statement released by VDOE, Virginia State Superintendent Steven R. Staples said, “The interactive graphics of the School Quality Profiles reveal important facts about quality and performance that otherwise might be lost in the data. Users can drill down to exactly the level of information they want, and if there are achievement gaps or other areas in need of improvement, those become obvious as the user interacts with the display.”

To learn more about the site’s functionality, watch the video below. The School Quality Profiles site is now live.

About the Author

Sri Ravipati is Web producer for THE Journal and Campus Technology. She can be reached at [email protected].

Featured

  • Abstract AI circuit board pattern

    Nonprofit LawZero to Work Toward Safer, Truthful AI

    Turing Award-winning AI researcher Yoshua Bengio has launched LawZero, a nonprofit aimed at developing AI systems that prioritize safety and truthfulness over autonomy.

  • abstract pattern of cybersecurity, ai and cloud imagery

    Report Identifies Malicious Use of AI in Cloud-Based Cyber Threats

    A recent report from OpenAI identifies the misuse of artificial intelligence in cybercrime, social engineering, and influence operations, particularly those targeting or operating through cloud infrastructure. In "Disrupting Malicious Uses of AI: June 2025," the company outlines how threat actors are weaponizing large language models for malicious ends — and how OpenAI is pushing back.

  • tutor and student working together at a laptop

    You've Paid for Tutoring. Here's How to Make Sure It Works.

    As districts and states nationwide invest in tutoring, it remains one of the best tools in our educational toolkit, yielding positive impacts on student learning at scale. But to maximize return on investment, both financially and academically, we must focus on improving implementation.

  • red brick school building with a large yellow "AI" sign above its main entrance

    New National Academy for AI Instruction to Provide Free AI Training for Educators

    In an effort to "transform how artificial intelligence is taught and integrated into classrooms across the United States," the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), in partnership with Microsoft, OpenAI, Anthropic, and the United Federation of Teachers, is launching the National Academy for AI Instruction, a $23 million initiative that will provide access to free AI training and curriculum for all AFT members, beginning with K-12 educators.