This is a project that I worked on for Killeen ISD in the central Texas area in the fall of 2021 to help report positive COVID-19 cases in their district. This was a major expansion of the dashboard that I created last year for the ISD.
Using Microsoft 365 applications, I designed an infrastructure that allows administration to input new positive COVID-19 cases, both lab-confirmed and probable, as they occur which then updates the website’s dashboard on a daily basis. This data updates automatically and not only populates the public-facing website dashboard but also multiple administrative dashboards that are used to inform decisions made by the administration.
Microsoft Power BI was used to create the dashboard, as seen in the screenshots below. Note that multiple pages were needed as Killeen ISD has 55 campuses in the district.
Title page of Killeen ISD Dashboard
The following are the key components of the Title page of this dashboard:
- Due to the size of the district, pages dedicated to each campus type (Elementary School, Middle School, High School, and Non-Campus staff buildings) were created. Users can navigate to the various pages by using the navigation buttons at the top of each page.
One of the campus pages in Killeen ISD Dashboard
The following are the key components of the campus pages for this dashboard:
- Each campus has the current positive COVID-19 test amounts shown for the students and employees on that campus. A total Active Case count for the entire campus is also given.
- A timeline of total confirmed cases in the last 10 days is given. Users can filter the timeline by campus if wanted.
In order to ensure that Killeen ISD did not have to manually update the dashboard, I set up the infrastructure so that after district administration input the new cases as they occur, everything is updated automatically. It was decided to schedule the Power BI refresh for each morning before school starts so that parents can make the best decision on whether to keep their child(ren) home or not.
In addition to the infrastructure and dashboard design, I assisted Killeen’s head nurse in her submission of new cases to the local health district by creating a Python application that automatically submitted each new case into the online survey system. This significantly cut down on her submission time and saved her between 3-5 hours of data entry per day.
This project was a pleasure to work on and it has helped parents, teachers and staff to make the best decision on whether to keep class in-person or move to a virtual solution.
Boles Data Consulting 