The Multilevel Evaluation Systems Project at the University of California at Los Angeles Center for Research on Evaluation Standards and Student Testing is investigating the feasibility of developing comprehensive automated information systems that might serve the planning and policy needs of school-based educators, district administrators, and school boards. The project design involves the following phases: (1) a multidisciplinary literature review to develop guiding principles for the design of school-based management information systems; (2) a review of existing district reporting practices; and (3) interviews with the potential user groups--school boards, district administrators, and principals--to refine the picture of the means by which they process and use information on school quality. The third stage is still in progress. Phases 1 and 2, reported here, covered evaluation utilization, information representation and decision-making, human cognition and computer data display, kinds of data reported, means of presenting reported information, and adherence of reports to data presentation guidelines. Preliminary findings indicate that school planners cannot or will not use the hypothetical-deductive model of problem-solving when using data to answer questions about their schools. This points to the need to provide interpretive information in non-technical language, to key interpretations to answer questions that school planners pose when reading reports, and to educate audiences about data uses. (TJH)