Newspapers blow a huge opportunity to use data to provide answers

Journalists love stories. Give us a good anecdote and we know what our lead is going to be. We’re not as comfortable with data. We know a good story is hiding in there somewhere, but most of us don’t know how to find it. And too many of us — reporters and executives alike — are refusing to learn.

My first exposure to the use of data for journalism was when I was at the Kansas City Star (or possibly the Kansas City Times; I worked for both) nearly 20 years ago. The late Greg Reeves, a kind of geeky reporter I didn’t know very well but came to admire, wrote a terrific story about the driving records of Kansas City police. I don’t recall the details, but I was shocked at how many police had offenses such as reckless driving (I think drunk driving, too, but I can’t vouch for my memory over that many years). What I do recall is that I started to understand the power of data analysis.

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Gazette disaster coverage featured at seminar

Journalists who covered Hurricane Katrina, the 2008 Eastern Iowa floods and the Parkersburg tornado will share their experience at a seminar in Davenport next month.

The Mid-America Press Institute‘s “Covering natural disasters” seminar starts Friday, April 17, at the Radisson Quad City Plaza Hotel in Davenport.

Mizell Stewart III, editor of the Evansville (Ind.) Courier & Press, who helped the Sun Herald in Biloxi, Miss., cover the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, will be the keynote speaker on April 17. David Purdy, a former Sun Herald photographer, will be one of the speakers on the final day, April 19.

I will be one of three Gazette journalists who will talk on Saturday, April 18, about what we learned in covering last year’s floods. I will lead an exercise on disaster coverage in the digital age. Mary Sharp, who led our breaking coverage and the flood team that cotinues to cover issues relating to disaster coverage, will discuss the continuing watchdog responsibility. Zack Kucharski, leader of the Gazette Communications data team, will discuss IowaFloodStories and other databases we developed in our flood coverage.

James Wilkerson of the Des Moines Register will join Zack to discuss databases, including the Register’s Parkersburg tornado map. Nancy Newhoff of the Waterloo Courier will discuss coverage of both the tornado and the flooding, which hit her coverage area less than three weeks apart.

Bruce Shapiro, executive director of the Dart Center for Journalism & Trauma, will close the seminar April 19 with a discussion of how journalists can deal with the personal toll of disaster coverage.

Other speakers will be The Gazette’s Cecelia Hanley (discussing coverage of a tornado when she was in Evansville), Mark Ridolfi of the Quad City Times, Christine Martin of the Southwest Indiana Disaster Resistant Community Corp., and Dee Bruemmer and Col. Robert Sinkler of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Register by email, phone (217-273-5812) or fax the flier below (217-581-2923). Registration is $50 for members ($40 for the second person from a member paper) and $75 ($65 for the second person) for non-members. Make your hotel reservation at 563-322-2200 by this Friday, April 3.

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