Alps Ascent Dashboard
Overview
The Dashboard is the first thing you'll see when you log in to Alps Ascent, and it's designed to give you an instant, at-a-glance view of how your KS3 cohorts are performing — without having to dig into individual subjects or students. This article walks through each part of the Dashboard and explains what it's showing you.
Filtering the Dashboard
At the top right of the screen you'll find two filters:
- Academic Year – switch between academic years to see historical or current data
- Year Group – narrow the view to a single year group, or leave it set to "All" to see every year group at once
Every widget on the Dashboard updates automatically based on these filters, so it's worth checking they're set correctly before drawing any conclusions from what you see.
Headline Metrics
Along the top of the page you'll find five summary cards:
Average Score shows the average score for each year group (Year 7, Year 8, Year 9), along with the effective date of the gradepoint the figure is based on. A positive number means students are, on average, performing above their target; a negative number means they're below target.
Total Active Students shows the total number of students currently included in your data across all year groups.
Total Subjects shows how many subjects are set up and being tracked in Ascent.
Gradepoints shows the total number of gradepoints (data collection points) that have been recorded across the year.
Average Grade shows the average grade for the latest gradepoint for each year group. This will display the grading language you have configured for Ascent.
Demographic Insights
Underneath the headline metrics, the Demographic Insights section breaks average score down by key student groups:
- Disadvantaged – students recorded as disadvantaged (Y) vs. not (N)
- SEND – students with SEN support vs. No SEN
- EAL – students who speak English as an additional language (Y) vs. not (N)
- Gender – Male vs. Female
For each group, you'll see the number and percentage of students in that category, along with their average score. This is a useful starting point for spotting attainment gaps between groups before exploring further in the Subjects or Students tabs.
Average Student Grade by Year Group
Below the demographic breakdown, a set of stacked bar charts (one per year group) shows how the number of students in each of your configured grade bands — e.g. Emerging, Developing, Enabling, Accelerating — has changed across gradepoints. Reading left to right lets you see whether a cohort is shifting up or down the bands over time, and the caption underneath tells you how many gradepoints and total entries the chart is based on.
On Track – Subject Grades
Alongside each year group's grade distribution chart sits an On Track bar, which shows the proportion of subject grades that are:
- Above Target
- On Target
- Below Target
The percentages are shown underneath the bar, along with the total number of student grades the figures are calculated from and the gradepoint they relate to. This is one of the fastest ways to check how "on track" a year group is as a whole.
Average Grade by Subject and Year Group
Further down the Dashboard, a grouped bar chart plots the average grade for every subject, split by year group. Each subject sits on the x-axis with a bar per year group plotted against your configured grading scale. This makes it easy to spot which subjects are performing strongly across all year groups, and which subjects or year groups might need closer attention.
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