Interpretation of the score reports from the Computer Program LOVS by teachers, internal support teachers and principals

•We studied educators’ interpretations of reports from a pupil monitoring system.•We found various stumbling blocks for educators when interpreting the reports.•Less than 30% of the respondents made sufficiently accurate interpretations.•We compared interpretations by teachers, internal support teachers and principals.•Teachers interpreted the reports significantly least correct.

Data-driven decision making, such as the decision making that is conducted through the use of pupil monitoring systems, has become increasingly popular in the Netherlands, as it is considered to have promise as a means of increasing pupils’ learning outcomes. The reports generated by the pupil-monitoring Computer Program LOVS (Cito) provide educators with reliable and objective data feedback; however, research has suggested that many users struggle with interpreting these reports. This study aims to investigate the extent to which the reports are correctly interpreted by educators, and to identify various potential stumbling blocks with regards to the interpretation of the reports. The results suggest that users encounter many stumbling blocks in these reports and often cannot interpret them entirely correctly.