I think the Dashboard should be used to view Projects from a high-level. Projects often have many Sections. Each of those Sections has many subtasks. And each of those subtasks likely has additional subtasks.
The Dashboard should show the status of each of those Sections and their subtasks, not just the subtasks directly assigned to the project. If there are a superfluous number of Sections within the Project, perhaps the user can choose a certain number of Sections within that project to monitor.