What is It
Requests from the general public for individual-level data, or aggregate data that includes small counts, which may contain Personally Identifiable Information (PII). CDE is restricted by federal and state law from providing PII data except under very specific circumstances. All requests for individual-level and unsuppressed aggregate data will be thoroughly reviewed for alignment with applicable laws and CDE's Data Confidentiality and Security Policy.
Process
Download and send your completed External Individual-Level and Unsuppressed Aggregate Data Request Form (DOCX) to DataRequests@cde.state.co.us.
Additional Requirements
Student Data: Review the Student PII External Research Request Process (PDF) for the steps involved.
Educator Data: Review the Educator PII External Research Data Request Review Rubric (PDF) for specific guidelines.
Data Sharing Agreement (DSA): All external parties approved to receive student or educator PII from CDE must be able to meet the terms of the Research Data Sharing Agreement (PDF) (DSA). Please review the template to ensure an understanding of the terms.
Timeline
This review process can take 6-12 months. The review process for external research requests for student PII usually takes at least 12 months. Do not make any commitments to use CDE data until you have received approval.
Important Notes
CDE will not provide student names for any research request.
Individual-level data without names or student/educator ID numbers can still be identifiable.
A Data Sharing Agreement (PDF) must be in place for all approved requests prior to the data request being fulfilled. The process for completing and signing Data Sharing Agreements can take multiple months.
Research projects should be narrowly focused and tightly defined. Project descriptions should have:
Clear and specific details about what information could be learned from the research and how it could be applied in other contexts, especially within and across Colorado.
Very specific research questions.
Clear rationale of why the specific data elements requested are necessary for the research. FERPA requires state agencies to share only the minimum data necessary for research projects. Data requested should be limited to exactly what is needed to answer very specific research questions.
Clear descriptions of methodology that explain all steps of the process and which are understandable to those who may not have a technical background.
Any request, or component of a request, that requires a small number of districts' data will be referred to those districts. Requests to the state should be limited to those requests for which only the state would be able to provide the necessary data (e.g. requests for data for all districts or a majority of districts).