You are entitled to your own opinions about policy, but not your own facts. M-Stat is an "indications and warning" system based on Baltimore's CitiStat program - itself inspired by the tool used by NYC police to help decisionmakers target resources and reduce crime. It tilts the basis of local decisionmaking from "my opinion" to "these facts."

Neither CitiStat nor M-Stat appear to be commerically available programs. They should be.  You are reading about a unique "competitive advantage" that should be a widespread "best practice."
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Gov. Martin O'Malley (D)… listened as school officials gave a PowerPoint presentation showing three schools, one each from affluent, middle-class and low-income neighborhoods, all with moribund math achievement among blacks and Hispanics…. "Trying to keep the pace and move the kids along has been very difficult," one school's principal said….


Montgomery school officials were showing off M-Stat, their version of a celebrated initiative that uses statistics and computers to identify and analyze problems…. Baltimore's school system was the first to adapt the program to public education, in 2001, shortly after O'Malley, the city's mayor… launched CitiStat in the city government….

Montgomery school officials held their first M-Stat meetings in September 2005. The full team meets for four hours once a month… Work centers on eight "leverage points," all related to student achievement, with a particular focus on the racial achievement gap…. "M-Stat is really designed to focus on, 'Where do we have achievement gaps, and what are we going to do about them?' " said Donald H. Kress, chief school performance officer for the Montgomery schools….

Yesterday's session… left participants with the disquieting fact that black and Hispanic students aren't reaping the benefits of attending high-performing schools…. One principal, representing a middle-class neighborhood, predicted that her minority math data would "flat-line" this year because the school is focusing on other reforms. In the often sugarcoated world of public education, that was a bold admission.

Daniel de Vise, Washington Post, May 1.

News Channel 7 WJLA Washington Post May 1