Dallas Independent School District's (ISD) efforts to develop a system of college readiness indicators began in 2008, when they received a Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation grant under the foundation's College-Ready Education initiative. With this grant, Dallas ISD's Performance Management and Analytics department developed a college readiness measurement model, as well as a dashboard and other data-driven measurement tools that would enable principals, teachers, and counselors to gauge the college readiness of their students. The college readiness measurement model, based on the work of the University of Chicago Consortium for Chicago School Research and David Conley's Education Policy Improvement Center, emphasized students' content knowledge, cognitive strategies, academic behaviors, and college context skills. The model also considered the college-going culture of schools and students' progress in college, as measured by data from the National Student Clearinghouse (NSC). Dallas ISD has received NSC data and reports since 2006. Although they had extensive data on student content knowledge, as measured by grades and various assessments, the model identified a need for data on cognitive strategies, academic behaviors, and context skills and awareness. In 2010, the Dallas ISD began work on a longitudinal diagnostic study of college readiness and success. The study, completed in 2011, analyzed data on more than 75,000 high school graduates spanning the years 1998 through 2009. It was found that although more than 50 percent of the district's graduates enroll in college some time after high school, only 15 percent completed some kind of degree or certificate. They knew this was unacceptably low and that they had a lot of work to do to prepare their students for the demands of the twenty-first-century economy. In 2011, Dallas ISD's college readiness work continued when the district became one of the sites for the work of the College Readiness Indicator Systems (CRIS) project. The CRIS initiative found a new life in the district's Evaluation and Assessment department, where their assessment and NSC data resided. Cecilia Oakeley, assistant superintendent for evaluation and assessment, saw the potential of this work to impact the college and career readiness of students and has been a valuable source of support and leadership.