Howard Bell

The good news in education? Graduation rates across the U.S. are soaring, with many school districts topping 95%. The bad news? Graduation isn’t always an accurate measurement of what prepares students for life after high school. Too many are arriving at colleges and jobs unprepared—especially students from historically disadvantaged communities. The problem, says Howard Bell, is that school districts aren’t using data to understand what classes and programs help students graduate ready for their next step. “They have no GPS,” he explains.

Bell has spent 25 years working in education, at Wayne State University’s TechTown Detroit entrepreneurship hub and companies like Scholastic. As the CEO of Abl, he and his team help large school districts such as Los Angeles Unified and Baltimore City Public Schools get a clear, data-driven view of course offerings, enrollment trends, staff distribution, and student goals, delving beyond district-wide averages to understand the needs of different groups of students. Abl’s nationally standardized college and career readiness measurement, sophisticated analytics, scheduling software, and professional development helps districts instantly understand the readiness of their students to take the next steps after high school.