Here are two technical research notes which depict licensing and quality data distributions from several states and national data bases maintained by the Research Institute for Key Indicators (RIKILLC).

• Licensing and Quality Descriptive Statistics with Graphic
• Licensing and Program Quality Data Distributions

The most prominent aspect of the data displays is the skewness of the licensing data in comparison to the quality data which are more normally distributed.  Because of the non-parametric tendencies of licensing data there are limitations in analyzing the data.  It also introduces certain unwanted results in which a good deal of mediocrity is introduced into the highest levels of compliance with licensing rules when compared to quality scores.  With these limitations in the data, certain methodologies were introduced to overcome these, such as risk assessment/weighting of rules and key indicator/predictor rules to focus and target monitoring reviews on the most critical health and safety rules/regulations.  Differential monitoring is the result when these two methodologies are employed in a program monitoring system.