In March 1993, the National Goals Panel Technical Planning Subgroup on Core Data Elements was convened to focus on the issue of identifying information that could be obtained from local student data systems for use in monitoring local and state progress toward the National Education Goals. This panel's report identified recommended data elements, but did not investigate their availability or their local utility. In 1994-95, the Far West Laboratory collected 250,000 student records as part of a demonstration project for the California Student Information System. This Automated Information Retrieval System Demonstration Project (AIRS) explicitly addressed data processing and data quality issues to determine the degree to which local student information systems contain the information needed to support data aggregation and to identify weaknesses and ways to overcome them. AIRS findings indicate that the set of data elements recommended by the National Education Goals Panel is far outside the scope of existing information systems and would require massive data collection of little practical value for local educators. In addition, the prescription to keep a longitudinal, cumulative record to each student is incompatible with student information update procedures and the need for current information. Appendix A defines the recommended core data elements, and Appendix B displays AIRS functions and requirements and file layout. Appendix C contains data coding specifications. (Contains 11 figures.) (SLD)