City Pulls Plug on Student Data System

After seven years and almost $100 million in construction costs, Department of Education officials are pulling the plug on its controversial data system because they said it never took off with parents or teachers.

The Achievement Reporting and Innovation System, known as ARIS, launched in 2007 as a way to manage student records that were previously split among different systems. School systems around the country were trying to manage all the new data they were required to track under the federal No Child Left Behind law. New York City had the most ambitious project not only because of its size but because the mission dovetailed nicely with former Mayor Michael Bloomberg's focus on tracking data.

ARIS was supposed to be a way for parents and teachers to track student test scores but, in fact, it was used mostly by department staffers. Many schools found it clunky and wound up contracting with other companies to create more streamlined websites for accessing student data. As first reported by the Daily News, only 16 percent of teachers used their own ARIS connection feature, and just 3 percent of parents accessed ARIS in the 2012-13 school year.

"The D.O.E. has decided to end our contract with Amplify as a result of the extremely high cost of the ARIS system, its limited functionality, and the lack of demand from parents and staff," said Department of Education spokeswoman Devora Kaye said. "The shockingly low usage of ARIS shows that the vast majority of families and D.O.E. staff don't find it a valuable tool and by developing an internal program we'll not only save millions of dollars, but better serve parents and school communities."

The ARIS system was under contract with Amplify, an education software company owned by Rupert Murdoch and managed by former New York City schools Chancellor Joel Klein. The Brooklyn-based company took over ARIS several years ago, before it was bought by Murdoch, when IBM wasn't able to finish the job.

But its contract will end next year, Kaye added. Instead, the department will create web-based options to replace ARIS's parent and teacher data portal in time for the 2015-16 school year. She said these in-house solutions will be created with funds that are now used to keep ARIS going.

Justin Hamilton, chief of staff for Amplify, defended his company's work on the project.

"Six years ago we were called in to fix this project when it was well underway. We did so on time and on budget.  Since then, we've been working over the past two years to wind down maintenance level work because of potential plans to transition to a new state system with similar-and in some cases-overlapping functions."

ARIS was widely criticized by parents and teachers for its cost, and poor functionality. Leonie Haimson, executive director of the group Class Size Matters, was one frequent critic. She said she's glad ARIS is winding down, but has questions about the cost and security of what will take its place.