Accessing Publicly Available Data

The California Department of Education (CDE) collects and reports information about California students at the school, district, county, and state levels. This information can be accessed through the Data Reports by Topic webpage. Additionally, select information is available in a mapping format through the Geo Hub web page. Users can also access mapping information through the Geographic Information Systems web page.

State and Federal privacy laws generally prohibit the CDE from providing student-level education data to requestors, unless they are Qualified Researchers from nonprofit organizations and state agencies conducting research for or on behalf of the CDE to improve education programs in accordance with the criteria outlined on the Research Data Request Process web page. The CDE’s data request portal is limited to working with qualified researchers and we are unable to accept requests from the public to create custom aggregates.

For requests that do not meet the requirements outlined on our research requests landing page, the CDE has created, primarily through a complex aggregation and suppression deidentification process, a large number of publicly available data resources, including enrollment data, demographic and student group data, staff data, school and district accountability, statewide assessment results, and school directory information. More information on available data can be found on the following webpage: Data Reports By Topic - Accessing Educational Data (CA Dept of Education).

Media Inquiries and Requests

Members of the press or other media outlets with data-related inquiries or requests that cannot be fulfilled using publicly available data resources must contact the CDE Communications Division for assistance. Media inquiries and requests can be sent to the CDE Communications Division using the Reporter Request Form, or by e-mail to communications@cde.ca.gov. Members of the press or other media outlets should not contact CDE program offices directly regarding their data-related inquires or requests.

In addition to the publicly available data resources provided above, another useful data resource for the media includes the Quick References webpage, which consolidates data about news, events, students, schools, teachers, and CDE history.

Legislative Inquiries and Requests

Members of the Legislature, state Constitutional Officers and their staff who have data-related inquires or requests that cannot be fulfilled using publicly available data resources should contact the CDE Governmental Affairs Division (GAD) for assistance. Legislative inquires and requests can be sent by e-mail to DL-GAD@cde.ca.gov. Additional information about legislative program assignments and contact information can be found on the CDE Governmental Affairs Program Assignment webpage.