The Office of the State Auditor (Office) today announces that the Project KIDS interactive dashboards have been updated with data for school year 2022-23.
Project KIDS is a special, in-depth performance audit of public education that integrates financial, operational, and performance data to create interactive visualizations. This informs Utah stakeholders where the money is going in public education so those stakeholders can better determine how well that money is being spent.
Project KIDS includes dashboards providing insights into many facets of Utah’s education spending:
- Teacher Pay
- High School Graduation Rates
- School Spending Map
- Peer School Comparisons
- School Performance by LEA
- LEA Spending & Performance
- Spending by Student Demographics
- Title I Program Effectiveness
State Auditor John Dougall explained:
“Utah taxpayers invest heavily in educating Utah’s school kids. Project KIDS helps decision makers, parents, taxpayers, and educators understand how that investment is being used so that future spending can be more effectively used to help students succeed. When I became State Auditor, the most common question I was asked was ‘Where does the money go in public education?’
“Project KIDS was our attempt to do what many considered impossible. We identified how spending reaches each and every student in Utah, whether through instructional activities, support services, school buildings, and many other categories. The Project KIDS team gathered data from the Utah State Board of Education, school districts, and charter schools. We integrated that data into a single system capturing spending activities and student outcomes throughout the educational system. From that data, our Office built a rich array of dashboards that present these crucial insights to stakeholders so they can then answer the question ‘How well is that money being spent?’
“Taxpayers should not be expected to pay for programs that do not help our children succeed. Project KIDS is an important and innovative tool which can help align limited financial resources behind critical strategic objectives to improve student learning for all students.”
The news release and related information may be found on the Office’s website at auditor.utah.gov.
Project KIDS can be found at: kids.utah.gov.
