Data in Schools Melbourne 2026

We have a lot of faith in measurements, and in data in general. This workshop will unsettle our faith and show how we can use the flaws in measurement to teach critical thinking with data science.

This session traces the data journey undertaken at Melbourne High School: from initial scoping and understanding the school’s decision-making needs, through data extraction and preparation, to early dashboarding, predictive modelling, and the development of more targeted approaches to student support and curriculum planning.
Rather than presenting analytics as a finished product or a simple technical solution, the session focuses on the practical work required to make school data useful: identifying the right questions, understanding the structure and limitations of available data, improving data quality, building trust in the outputs, and translating findings into conversations that educators can act on.
Drawing on recent work at Melbourne High School, Dr Steve Mason will discuss how the school moved from retrospective reporting toward earlier and more strategic use of data. This included developing dashboards to better understand patterns in achievement and engagement, then extending that work into predictive modelling to identify where student outcomes may be improved through timely intervention.
The session will also reflect on Melbourne High School’s broader improvement context, including its achievement as the top school in the country for median ATAR. This result was not the product of analytics alone. It was the outcome of strong teaching, high expectations, student effort, curriculum leadership, and sustained school-wide practice. The role of data was to support that work by helping staff see patterns earlier, ask sharper questions, and make more informed decisions.
Attendees will see how predictive modelling, explainable drivers, data-quality checks, and scenario testing can be used as part of a broader school improvement cycle. The focus is not on replacing professional judgement, but on strengthening it: using data to support curriculum planning, student support, intervention design, and more timely conversations about learning growth.