State and school report cards provide a powerful avenue for states to reach families and the broader public as essential partners in improving student outcomes. The federal Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) and many state legislatures require states to publish an array of education data including measures at the state, district, and school levels. The report cards also go deeper, illuminating how these measures vary for students by race and ethnicity, income, language, disability, and other characteristics. State and school report cards that effectively communicate these data to the public can inform educators and families, help them ask better questions, and ultimately, drive school improvement to support all students. To answer questions about student performance, state education agencies have increased their capacity to collect, manage, analyze, and make decisions based on data over the last 15 years. While states have made substantial progress, too few families, community leaders, and other stakeholders regularly review and act on states' education data. The next frontier for state leadership is to advance beyond providing access to data to driving the use of data. Effective use of data is critical to more effectively support educators and students. When educators have comprehensive information about student performance and can consider that information for all students and based on different student populations, they can start to take critical steps towards addressing achievement gaps. This report includes several specific examples of how data can be used effectively to address equity issues: (1) Initiating conversations about equity with diverse stakeholders; (2) Publicly examining data on current performance and trends; (3) Disaggregating data in meaningful ways to identify disparities in opportunity and outcomes; and (4) Publicly sharing data on measures of students' progress after graduation and long-term success. With this resource, the authors highlight practices and questions to help state education agencies increase use of state and school report cards for decision-making and continuous school improvement. [For the companion report, "Communicating Performance: A Best Practice Resource for Developing State Report Cards," see ED595053.]