EDSTAR Analytics

Every color on your screen is really just three tiny lights: red, green, and blue.

This short visual explainer follows one color on its whole journey. From the glowing pixels you are looking at right now, to the hex codes programmers type, to the ink that hits the paper when you print.

Simple math, no coding needed. The STEM and STEAM hiding inside a single color.

Watch it here:

How Colors Work on a Computer--The Math Behind the Art Every color on your screen is really just three tiny lights — red, ...

What does a panicking KFC manager have in common with a frozen grant writer? Both confronted basic arithmetic and blinked in confusion.

Chapter 7 of Mismatched finally names the pattern that has been building all book: the Lotta Chicken Principle. Institutional authority meeting basic quantitative reasoning and freezing up.

A few of the moments it traces:
- A KFC manager named Dave, stunned that numbers could solve a real problem: how much chicken a Little League order needs.
- A head grant writer who called enrollment projections impossible, until a simple spreadsheet modeled student flows and secured 10 million dollars in federal funding.
- PhDs summing columns by hand on paper printouts. Computers sitting on desks as expensive electric typewriters.
- Data departments where no one could build a pivot table, write a formula, or run a query, making decisions in an evidence vacuum while surrounded by unused data.

The solution was almost always trivially simple. The blindness was the problem.

Dr. Janet Johnson conclusion: the taxonomy that sorts students also sorts educators, rewarding credentials over capability at every level. The sorting machine doesnt just sort students. It sorts everyone.

Watch the Chapter 7 summary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CdbNlZNp1jk&list=PLKQ6KcvXIo068Cl7pDLpr3ErSeAnz5Z7r&index=10

EDSTAR Analytics has a new look.
The work behind it has not changed. For more than 32 years we have helped schools, community colleges, and grant-funded programs turn educational data into better decisions. Program evaluation, grant writing, data management, and technical assistance, every engagement led by senior consultants who stay with you from proposal through reporting.
Refreshed brand. Same standard: evidence you can use, not just report.
See what we do at edstaranalytics.com

You spent years in art class learning that red, yellow, and blue make every other color. Then you bought a printer and discovered it runs on cyan, magenta, yellow, and black. So which "primary" colors are actually primary?
In her latest video, Dr. Janet Johnson unpacks why screens, printers, and elementary school paint sets all disagree, and what that reveals about how light, ink, and the human eye actually work.
https://youtu.be/X2BXOlirNxw?si=fs2X8sEykbIQ-tmR

What happens when you finally see how the system actually works?

In Chapter 5 of "Mismatched," Dr. Janet Johnson returns as a math teacher in the 1980s. The same gatekeeping that once blocked her path is now visible to her every day — a counselor telling her that brilliant students from the wrong neighborhoods "aren't the kinds who take advanced math." A certification system that turned her degree and experience into nothing without the right piece of paper. And then one phone call to "Bill's wife" handed her three certifications instantly.

It was, as the chapter puts it, a social network dressed up in bureaucratic clothing.

Watch "Shifting Foundations" — Chapter 5 of Mismatched with Dr. Janet Johnson:
https://youtu.be/tcySi0aodck

Shifting Foundations (Summary) | Mismatched Chapter 5 From blocked student to insider witness—what happens when you finally see how the gatekeeping machinery works?In the 1980s, Janet Johnson became a mathematic...

What does a Kentucky Fried Chicken kitchen teach us about leadership in America?

In Chapter 4 of "Mismatched," Dr. Janet Johnson shares the moment a fast-food manager froze at a simple math problem — and what it revealed about authority, competence, and the systems that promote people.

A Little League coach ordered fifty boxes of chicken. The assistant manager panicked. A napkin calculation solved it in minutes.

The real lesson wasn't about chicken. It was about how institutions reward credentials and connections over actual capability — and what that costs us in education, in business, and in the people we hand authority to.

Watch Chapter 4 — "Lotta Chicken, Lotta Boxes":
https://youtu.be/j316S9eWyk8

What does a Kentucky Fried Chicken kitchen teach us about leadership in America?

In Chapter 4 of "Mismatched," Dr. Janet Johnson shares the moment a fast-food manager froze at a simple math problem — and what it revealed about authority, competence, and the systems that promote people.

A napkin calculation solved the problem in minutes. But the real lesson wasn't about chicken. It was about how institutions reward credentials and connections over actual capability.

Watch Chapter 4 now: https://youtu.be/j316S9eWyk8

EdstarAnalytics Lotta Chicken, Lotta Boxes (Summary) | Mismatched Chapter 4

We've known for decades that schools use demographics instead of achievement data to decide which students get access to advanced mathematics. So why hasn't anything changed?
https://youtu.be/xe5scfPgPGA?si=tvClORzjFo_tcz2Z

We are posting podcasts and videos of all of our research at

Research – janet johnson writes Academic research transformed into accessible videos and podcast discussions. While copyright prevents republishing my journal articles, AI tools like NotebookLM allow me to create new ways to share what the research says—bringing findings to life for parents, educators, and policymakers who need ...

More from our evaluation of North Carolina's math remediation pilot program—this time in podcast form.
Too many high school graduates were arriving at community college needing to retake math before they could begin their programs. North Carolina decided to fix the problem earlier, requiring that remediation happen while students are still in high school.

We evaluated this new approach in 11 districts over two years. In this podcast, we break down what worked, what we learned, and what it means for students.

This is part of our effort to use new AI tools to share what we discover through our program evaluations—because research shouldn't stay buried in reports.

Fixing the Math Gap Before College | Career and College Ready Graduates Pilot Study Why do so many students arrive at community college needing math remediation—and what happens when we try to fix the problem earlier? In this conversation, w...