Using data is an essential skill in 21st-Century journalism. This handout helps you to learn more about the data sources on your beat and how to access and use them. It was compiled by Steve Buttry, Writing Coach, Omaha World-Herald, and reporters Paul Goodsell, Joe Kolman, Nichole Aksamit and Cindy Gonzalez for a workshop at the World-Herald, Oct. 23, 2002.
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Mining the Data on Your Beat

No competent reporter would consider doing the job without knowing how to interview or take notes or to dig for records. In 21st-Century journalism, using data is not a specialized skill. It's an essential skill. Whatever your level of ability, you should seek to learn more about the data sources on your beat and how to access and use them.

  • Ask for electronic records.
    When an agency you cover releases a report or some annual statistics, ask for the report on disk or CD or as an e-mail attachment. We can incur significant expenses when we ask public agencies to sort data for us (though often much less than they might tell you initially). But every report already exists in an electronic file that should be easy and cheap to obtain. If you provide the disk, it shouldn't cost anything. Whether you use the data immediately or not, we should have it on hand electronically.
  • Pursue the data.
    Ask for data as aggessively as you insist on access to any other public record. You must not be intimidated when it comes to asking for electronic information. When someone cites facts in an interview, you already are used to asking, "How do you know that?" and asking for copies of any reports the source is citing. Ask for an electronic copy as well. Often the source would rather e-mail you the report rather than find an envelope anyway. Don't ask just for the report itself, but for the data on which it was based.
  • Consider different uses.
    As you learn about data sources, consider what stories you might pursue based primarily on this data. Consider how you might use this data for information to support other stories you might do. Consider how you might use the data routinely. Consider how the data might be useful to colleagues on other beats.
  • Use the Internet.
    Visit the Web sites of public agencies and private organizations on your beat and learn what data sources are available readily online. Learn what reports and statistics are posted online. Learn whether the agencies post searchable databases online or pdf files that are more cumbersome to use online (but might identify electronic records you could obtain to sort and search yourself). Browse the databases to learn what information they offer and consider how that information might be useful in stories.
  • Get budgets.
    Obtain the budgets and spending records of public agencies in electronic form so you can use a spreadsheet to look for trends, changes, irregularities.
  • Get directories.
    Learn what sort of basic information the agencies on your beat might have in electronic form: personnel rosters, payroll records, government board rosters.
    Get an updated version of the payroll records periodically -- say quarterly -- and you'll have a good way of tracking government raises. It's searchable and, thus, a nice way to double-check a name spelling and job title and salary, a good way to know who's been with the city the longest and who's a newbie, an easy way to access a list of the city's highest and lowest-paid employees. It's particularly useful when a city employee makes other news -- gets arrested or fired or wins an award -- or when you are just searching for an employee who might have been around during a particular time period or has experience in a given area.
  • Listen for data behind statistics.
    When sources tell you they are tracking or studying something -- a certain kind of complaint, the condition of city roads, housing code violations, etc. -- chances are they are working from a database or a spreadsheet. Ask "How do you know that noise complaints have risen or that 65 percent of the streets are in good condition?" and then ask to see their work, which may prompt other stories.
  • Interview the data.
    Think of data as another source that you interview. Do you want to know how many single mothers of a particular race live in North Omaha? You could probably call a number of people and get some vague answers and some anecdotal sense of whether the number is growing or declining, but why not ask the Census? Think of questons you could ask the data on your beat: What bar has the most liquor law violations? What school has the best test scores? What intersection has the most accidents?
  • Study the data first.
    Reporters are at such an advantage when they go into an interview knowing at least something, and sometimes a lot, about the information the source deals with. If you can find some data online or in a database we already have in the newsroom, check that before you interview a source. It helps you ask better questions and helps you catch the source in mistakes or lies.
  • Organize with spreadsheets.
    A spreadsheet helps you understand information. You spot relationships, trends, reversals, gaps. You can use a spreadsheet for something as simple as a source list or chronology, or to analyze thousands of pieces of data.
  • Enter data yourself.
    Sure, it's nice to get data e-mailed to you, but don't forget that you can enter data yourself. Often an afternoon at a courthouse or government office searching through paper records yields a notebook full of information you can analyze and understand better if you take a few hours to enter it in a spreadsheet.
  • Use Outlook.
    Even if you can't get Excel on your computer, at least make full use of Outlook. That's a database of sources and dates that will help you get used to entering and searching for data. Learn the different ways you can use Outlook and organize at least your source files to make them fully searchable.
  • Use Census data.
    Census data are not just the basis for Census stories, but provide helpful information about families, housing, economics and communities. Go to http://www.census.gov/ and on the home page, you see a place where you can enter your state and get specific data for a state. On the page for that state, you can choose a county and get more specific data. The home page for the Census also has a topical index to still more reports.
  • Seek federal data.
    If you're working on a story that might have federal data, check out http://www.firstgov.gov. It has a search engine that goes through all federal agencies and another that goes through the states. If, for instance you want the Office of blah blah blah, but you don't know what division of what federal agency it's buried in, this will pull it up. It's also good for pulling up documents and stats.
  • Seek state data.
    If you want state data for Nebraska, check out http://www.nitc.state.ne.us/itc/sg.htm. It has an incredible wealth of information. It lists the Information Technology plans for most of Nebraska's state agencies. The value in it is that the agencies list all the information they keep on databases and what format it is in. So instead of calling and asking the fire marshal if he had a database of fireworks dealers and what was in it, you call him and say you want a copy of the Access database for all fireworks dealers. (When Joe did this, he actually said he didn't know if they had such a thing, and Joe pointed him to their IT plan). Just flipping through it will give anyone a bunch of ideas. For instance, the governor's office keeps track of everyone who contacts him and what they wanted in an Access database. For "security" reasons, they've made the list more difficult to search, but we have a paper copy, or you can read through the full pdf file that's still at the Web site. Every state and government entity had to make such a list for Y2K preparations. The agency in your beat probably has one.
  • Think critically about data.
    Joe has this quote from Dick O'Reilly of the LA Times taped to his desk: "The most important lessons in CAR are not which keys to push on the keyboard, but how to think critically about data. People who learn to think that way will learn which keys to push because doing so becomes fundamental to their quests. People who only learn what keys to push really haven't learned anything."

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