In the coming school year, students who accrue too many absences, get into too much trouble or fall behind in class will be flagged in a new computerized "early-warning system" designed to direct interventions to kids who need it the most.

The Department of Education hopes identifying those students will help schools catch problems earlier.

"Schools can use it as a watch list," said Jean Nakasato, a DOE educational specialist in the student support branch. "It helps them to make sure they can catch all kids so they don’t fall between the cracks. It really is a prevention tool."

The system, which will track students in kindergarten through 12th grade, is modeled after similar dropout prevention data programs in other states, and comes as schools and complexes are looking to make smarter decisions about how to use limited resources.

The system could help schools determine more quickly which students to help — before they need more intensive support —and could provide faster analysis on whether interventions are working.

But DOE officials emphasize the program requires planning and monitoring at schools to ensure data are being properly interpreted, and that interventions are put in place and then evaluated. The DOE is rolling out the system, which will officially be available to all schools on July 2, with training statewide for school administrators.

The program was piloted in 14 schools across four complexes beginning in October, and several participating principals said the system was an easy way to see which kids need additional assistance.

Molokai High tried out the system in the school year that just ended, and Principal Stanford Hao said it helped counselors and teachers get struggling students help before problems got too big.

No freshmen were held back at the school in May, a major success for a school (enrollment: 340) with a graduation rate of 78 percent and a ninth-grade flunk rate of 7 percent in 2010-11.

It’s too early to attribute the promotion of all freshmen at the school to the early-warning system, but Hao said the program has made clearer "which students may not be on the path that we want them to be." He added, "We can address them more immediately."

But administrators and a national "early-warning" system researcher also point out the tool is just a tool. It won’t figure out why a student is doing poorly or what kind of intervention will help.

"Early warning indicators are … a flag. They are an SOS," said Susan Therriault, senior researcher with the Washington, D.C.-based National High School Center, a not-for-profit research organization. "They won’t help professionals in the school system diagnose. They will help them monitor to understand what’s getting better."

Therriault said many states are now using such "early-warning" systems, especially at high schools, to bring down dropout rates. But systems vary widely from place to place: Some states or districts are providing schools with a snapshot of data once a year; others have data systems that are being continually updated and monitored.

Hawaii’s early-warning system is among the newer generation of such failure prevention programs. It is fed by multiple data systems that are constantly updated, and was built into the state’s existing online student support system to encourage more frequent use.

The program includes data on course grades, absences and disciplinary incidents for students. For elementary school students, it has data on six "general learner outcomes," indicating if a student is, for example, a "self-directed learner" or "complex thinker."

The system is color-coded: Students off track on one of the indicators are highlighted in red; those approaching the danger zone are flagged in yellow; and everyone else is green.

The DOE could not immediately say how much the program costs, but officials characterized it as nominal because the system was not built from the ground up and training is being conducted in-house.

The department would not release any statistics from the pilot, saying they were still being gathered and had not yet been analyzed.

Janice Espiritu, principal at Kaunakakai Elementary, which was among the schools that piloted the program, said the system allowed more targeted intervention for kids and also prompted broader discussions about how the campus was doing overall.

She said in an early analysis, the school’s data appeared to improve over the course of the pilot. And she pointed out the program doesn’t only have to be about identifying kids who are struggling. It was also used at the school last year to spot kids who are excelling or showing improvement, Espiritu said.

Michael Tokioka, the principal at Aiea High, said among the biggest challenges of the new system will be getting everyone at the school into the habit of using it regularly. "You can have a system, but what the teacher does with it is important," he said.

He added, "These kinds of things do take time."