Educational Monitoring at the Community Level (KBM) was a project within the framework program for “Learning in the community“ (LvO), funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) – the LvO initiative was jointly launched by BMBF and German foundations. Educational monitoring can be understood as a continuous, largely data-based process of observing and analysing an education system in its entirety as well as its individual components, for the purpose of informing educational policy and the public regarding framework conditions, process characteristics, outcomes and benefits of educational processes. The KBM project and participating communities (districts, local authorities) created a foundation for a coherent educational management and for evidence-based educational policy.