Tag Archives: Data Storytelling Toolkit for Librarians

Data storytelling in libraries

I had no idea that thee was such enthusiasm for data storytelling but it seems libraries require a kit for the topic. From an August 30, 2022 University of Illinois School of Information Sciences news release (also on EurekAlert), Note: A link has been removed,

A new project led by Associate Professor Kate McDowell and Assistant Professor Matthew Turk of the School of Information Sciences (iSchool) at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign will help libraries tell data stories that connect with their audiences. Their project, “Data Storytelling Toolkit for Librarians,” has received a two-year, $99,330 grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS grant RE-250094-OLS-21), under the Laura Bush 21st Century Librarian Program, which supports innovative research by untenured, tenure-track faculty.

“There are thousands of librarians who are skittish about data but love stories,” explained McDowell, who co-teaches a data storytelling course at the iSchool with Turk. “And there are hundreds of librarians who see data as fundamental, but until those librarians have a language through which to connect with the passions of the thousands who love stories, this movement toward strategic data use in the field of libraries will be stifled, along with the potential collaborative creativity of librarians.”

The data storytelling toolkit will provide a set of easy-to-adapt templates, which librarians can use to move quickly from data to story to storytelling. Librarians will be able to use the toolkit to plug in data they already have and generate data visualization and narrative structure options.

“To give an example, public libraries need to communicate employment impact. In this case, the data story will include who has become employed based on library services, how (journey map showing a visual sequence of steps from job seeking to employment), a structure for the story of an individual’s outcomes, and a strong data visualization strategy for communicating this impact,” said McDowell.

According to the researchers, the toolkit will be clearly defined so that librarians understand the potential for communicating with data but also fully adaptable to each librarian’s setting and to the communication needs inside the organization and with the public. The project will focus on community college and public libraries, with initial collaborators to include Ericson Public Library in Boone, Iowa; Oregon City (OR) Public Library; Moraine Valley Community College in Palos Hills, Illinois; Jackson State Community College in Jackson, Tennessee; and The Urbana Free Library.

McDowell’s storytelling research has involved training collaborations with advancement staff both at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and the University of Illinois system; storytelling consulting work for multiple nonprofits including the 50th anniversary of the statewide Prairie Rivers Network that protects Illinois water; and storytelling lectures for the Consortium of Academic and Research Libraries in Illinois (CARLI). McDowell researches and publishes in the areas of storytelling at work, social justice storytelling, and what library storytelling can teach the information sciences about data storytelling. She holds both an MS and PhD in library and information science from Illinois.

Turk also holds an appointment with the Department of Astronomy in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at the University of Illinois. His research focuses on how individuals interact with data and how that data is processed and understood. He is a recipient of the prestigious Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation’s Moore Investigator Award in Data-Driven Discovery. Turk holds a PhD in physics from Stanford University.

I found some earlier information about a data storytelling course taught by the two researchers, from a September 25, 2019 University of Illinois School of Information Sciences news release, which provides some additional insight,

Collecting and understanding data is important, but equally important is the ability to tell meaningful stories based on data. Students in the iSchool’s Data Science Storytelling course (IS 590DST) learn data visualization as well as storytelling techniques, a combination that will prove valuable to their employers as they enter the workforce.

The course instructors, Associate Professor and Interim Associate Dean for Academic Affairs Kate McDowell and Assistant Professor Matthew Turk, introduced Data Science Storytelling in fall 2017. The course combines McDowell’s research interests in storytelling practices and applications and Turk’s research interests in data analysis and visualization.

Students in the course learn storytelling concepts, narrative theories, and performance techniques as well as how to develop stories in a collaborative workshop style. They also work with data visualization toolkits, which involves some knowledge of coding.

Ashley Hetrick (MS ’18) took Data Science Storytelling because she wanted “the skills to be able to tell the right story when the time is right for it.” She appreciated the practical approach, which allowed the students to immediately apply the skills they learned, such as developing a story structure and using a pandas DataFrame to support and build a story. Hetrick is using those skills in her current work as assistant director for research data engagement and education at the University of Illinois.

“I combine tools and methods from data science and analytics with storytelling to make sense of my unit’s data and to help researchers make sense of theirs,” she said. “In my experience, few researchers like data for its own sake. They collect, care for, and analyze data because they’re after what all storytellers are after: meaning. They want to find the signal in all of this noise. And they want others to find it too, perhaps long after their own careers are complete. Each dataset is a story and raw material for stories waiting to be told.”

According to Turk, the students who have enrolled in the course have been outstanding, “always finding ways to tell meaningful stories from data.” He hopes they leave the class with an understanding that stories permeate their lives and that shaping the stories they tell others and about others is a responsibility they carry with them.

“One reason that this course means a lot to me is because it gives students the opportunity to really bring together the different threads of study at the iSchool,” Turk said. “It’s a way to combine across levels of technicality, and it gives students permission to take a holistic approach to how they present data.”

I didn’t put much effort into it but did find three other courses on data storytelling, one at the University of Texas (my favourite), one at the University of Toronto, and one (Data Visualization and Storytelling) at the University of British Columbia. The one at the University of British Columbia is available through the business school, the other two are available through information/library science faculties.