Data Journalism@MSCNE

2014

Dr. Barry HollanderGrady Collegebarryhollander.com

Data Journalism@MSCNE

These slides are online at http://www.barryhollander.com/MSCNE14.pptx

2014

Who the hell am I and why am I talking about this?

1. Been a working journalist.

2. Used the Internet a while.

3. Learned to crunch data in grad school.

4. Teach it now to unsuspecting j-students.

5. Cecil ran out of people to ask. That left me.Plus I get a snazzy t-shirt

The word “data” scares people. It means coding.

It means math.

And as we all know …

The word “data” scares people. It means coding.

It means math.

And as we all know …

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_xjgI5oN8DM

Data Journalism@MSCNE

These slides are online at http://www.barryhollander.com/MSCNE14.pptx

2014

We’re going to talk aboutpainless data journalism

1. Stuff you can do. Now.

2. Stuff that makes good stories.

3. Stuff that requires simple skills.

4. Stuff that creates evergreen material.

5. And stuff that uses better words than “stuff.”

or, mostly painless

A Quick Historyreal quick, this ain’t history class

Data used in 1800s, from The Guardian to Florence Nightingale's report on health and mortality

In 1952, CBS News and the UNIVAC

In 1967, Phil Meyer on Detroit riots, later with Miami and Philadelphia papers on property values and criminal sentencing.

Personal computers, more tools emerged. Support groups, like IRE and NICAR.

If there is a growth industry in journalism, it’s data journalism (along with – sigh – Buzzfeed).

Why do data matter?

Take us beyond the Who, What, When, Where, and into Why and How

Verify and solidify traditional reporting methods

Can show what’s happened and even, if done right, a glimpse into the future

Increases the credibility of your work, very important

Gives sense and structure to lots of information for your audience

Can open new approaches and ways to tell a story

Allows you to provide independent interpretation of official information and data

And let’s you play with fun toys

FiveComponents

1. The story or issue or event or incident

2. Curiosity

3. The data (format, structure, origin)

4. Solid reporting and interviewing (not just of people, but the data itself)

5. A data-driven mindset, seeking patterns and comparisons, a social science mentality

Nerd Moment: Think in terms of Variables, which have Attributes and Values.

Variable: Crime Attribute: Arson, murder, etc.Value: How many of each, or per capita, etc.

Data areEverywhere

But remember, stories are about people. Never ever forget that.

Really. I mean it. People first, dammit

1. Finding data, negotiating access

3. Interviewing the data, skeptical analysis

4. Data Viz

2. Cleaning the data

5. And don’t forget … real people

Ninety percent of data journalism is done with that old friend, the spreadsheet.

Especially Excel

But more often now, Google spreadsheets

Simply put, a spreadsheet is the basic tool of all data-driven journalism, at least on the analysis side.

When we talk about the visual display of data or graphics, that’s a different story. Not one I’ll tell today.

http://nces.ed.gov/ipeds/datacenter/

http://www.ope.ed.gov/security/

Examples of GoodData SourcesImages below clickable

BonusYou probably have an office of institutional research on your campus. I promise, someone is in charge of data. Make them your friend. So. Much. Data.

Finally, steal shamelessly from others, such as the NYTimes Student Loan Calculator.

Examples fromdata I’ve used

Here’s the part where I show you data I’ve collected and played with, just to show you examples of how easy it is to do.

Steal these ideas. Use them.

Dumb (and not so dumb)

Ideas ForData Stories

Use Yelp for nearly anything, such as a comparison of college towns and coffee shops. Not unlike what 538 is doing for burritos, which everyone from Slate to LATimes covered. The lesson here? Be creative.

Ye olde grocery story. Create a typical “college student grocery basket” (fun exercise in and of itself) and price it out at local groceries. Multiply by # of weeks in a semester or year.

Assign someone to stand at a key intersection and count the people driving while staring at their phones. Also, the number of pedestrians doing the same.

Students have those annoying but lovable guide dogs in training on campus?

Human Subjects (Institutional Review Board) on campus. Fun data, because everyone loves to experiment on college sophomores.

Basically, (1) for any story, ask if there may be data, or (2) find odd and interesting data, build a story around it.

Another fun one: check out the Wikipedia page for your school or key people. How often edited? By whom? What changes? Controversial stuff? Here’s UGA’s history.

Data Journalism@MSCNE

2014

These slides are online at http://www.barryhollander.com/MSCNE14.pptx

Extra stuff later, probably not used, but I hate deleting slides

UC loses millions on interest-rate bets

Private college leaders do well

College sports thrive during economic downturn

Searching IRE under “dormitories”Always steal shamelessly by searching IRE’s site.

NYTimes student loan calculator. Check out schools, compare.

StoryExamples

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/your-money/student-loan-repayment-calculator.html

http://nces.ed.gov/ipeds/datacenter/

Common data sethttp://www.commondataset.org/But, gotta go to your individual school or skuls, much of it available via IPEDS.

Does your cop shop put stuff online, like UGA?Put link here for themhttp://www.police.uga.edu/

And use crime maps like thishttps://www.crimereports.com/map?search=ATHENS%2C+GA

IRE’s Extra-extra. Worth your time. http://ire.org/blog/extra-extra/But also search for “education” or even “university”Steal shamelessly.http://ire.org/blog/extra-extra/education/

http://ire.org/search/?q=university

Example stories

http://ire.org/blog/extra-extra/2014/05/02/college-sports-revenue-goes-despite-recession/

http://ire.org/blog/extra-extra/2014/04/16/new-york-times-investigates-bungled-sexual-assault/

http://ire.org/blog/extra-extra/2014/03/05/university-california-losing-millions-dollars-inte/

http://ire.org/blog/extra-extra/2014/01/27/missouri-public-universities-spend-millions-lobbyi/

http://ire.org/blog/extra-extra/2014/01/20/free-game-tickets-hot-concert-seats-politics-highe/

http://ire.org/blog/extra-extra/2013/11/20/gilded-goodbye-many-private-college-leaders/

http://ire.org/search/?q=dormitories