Data visualisation
Background
The data visualisation project is a project within the Education Skills Funding Agency (ESFA) of the Department for Education which set out to help providers make better sense of their individualised learner record (ILR) data.
Providers expressed problems in reporting as a consequence of multiple separate systems feeding from the IRL which manipulated the data in different ways.
To add to this problem, existing platforms provided by the ESFA output data inconsistently and did so in an untimely manner.
Overall, providers found the experience daunting and time consuming; increasingly so for smaller providers with limited access to outsourced software and specialised teams.
The goal
The goal of the project was to produce a dashboard solution that empowered providers by providing a personalised assessment of their IRL data. In doing so, users will have a means of knowing what to expect while their IRL data is being reviewed by the ESFA.
We set out to develop a solution for our users that joins up data outputs in a comprehensive way, based on the following principles - easy to use, easy to understand, and simplifies the existing process.
The dashboard is split into two parts, the upper part including the navigation is built in HTML to Government design system standards. The second part of the of the dashboard has the data visualisation in a PowerBI report.
The first iteration had the navigation built into the PowerBI report, we found this problematic to load a new report from within a PowerBI report.
Year on year data: The process
The goal of the Year on year pages is to allow providers to measure their performance metrics and funding breakdown over time by bringing in previous submission data. As a result, providers would be able to gauge their performance across multiple years, be that a comparison between the current year and previous year or a select combination of years.
