If you fill out the "Forgot Password" form but don't get an email to reset your password within 5-10 minutes, please email logistics@ire.org for assistance.
Meleah Holmes, a student at Norfolk State University and a 2016 CAR Conference Knight Scholar, talks to Kimbriell Kelly, a investigative reporter at The Washington Post.
Holmes: In your own words, what is an investigative journalist?
Kelly: A reporter who produces in-depth work using thorough research, analysis and reporting methods to convey what they have found.
Holmes: Using one word, describe what type of journalist you are.
Kelly: Strategic.
Holmes: What interest you most about investigative journalism?
Kelly: The ability to tell in-depth stories, backed up by research, that are often untold and difficult to find.
Holmes: In one sentence, describe what you would like people who read your work to take away from it.
Kelly: I would like for them to have learned something new, and that the thing they learned challenged their prior beliefs or thinking on an issue.
Holmes: How are you most productive when completing a story/project?
Kelly: I'm most productive when I'm organized, empathetic, focused and open to learning something new and challenging my own beliefs.
Holmes: In five years, where do you see your career?
Kelly: I will still be doing investigative reporting, but perhaps editing as well.
Holmes: What is the best piece of advice you can offer to an aspiring investigative journalist/reporter?
Kelly: Learn a new skill and become the best at it.
Jocelyn Stargell-Zachery talks with Lee Zurik, evening anchor and chief investigative reporter at WVUE-TV in New Orleans.
Stargell-Zachery: What sparked your interest in the field of journalism?
Zurik: I was kind of a freak, and I wanted to be in journalism since I was like 10 years old. I like telling stories. I am always curious and I like to ask questions. Also, I like the fact that no day is the same, and that is really what drew me to journalism.
Q: What is a typical day on the job for you?
A: Well, I anchor and report, so a typical day for me would be me coming into work, looking at emails, returning phone calls, looking through records, and filing public records request. I usually pop into our newsroom meeting and then proceed to brainstorm some story ideas. Finally, after all that is done, I then prepare for the evening newscast.
Q: How did you go about landing your first job?
A: I went back home after graduating from Syracuse University in New York. I drew a circle around all the smaller market stations that I wanted to work at in New Orleans within driving distance and flooded them all with my tapes. So I sent those out and followed up with phone calls, and a certain station said they had not seen it yet. The next day they called me back and said, could I interview tomorrow? I said yes. I came for the interview and they hired me on the spot.
Q: What is your favorite story that you have worked on?
A: It was series called “Louisiana Purchased” and it looked at campaign financing in Louisiana. It was a wide range of stories that changed state laws, launched three FBI investigations and forced politicians to repay money. We got a lot of result out of that one and a ton of response from our viewers, and it was just great.
Jocelyn Stargell-Zachery is a student at Savannah State University and a 2016 CAR Conference Knight Scholar.
By Jennifer Lu
Judging by the “oohs” and “ahhs” of appreciation from the audience, ProPublica reporters Ryann Grochowski Jones and Charles Ornstein reminded us why the humble Excel spreadsheet is still an excellent resource for data journalists. In this hands-on session, they covered how to use Excel for health care reporting.
To cover health care and Big Pharma, Grochowski Jones and Ornstein wrangled lengthy rows of data and made data searchable down to the granular level. How much money has your doctor received from drug companies? Check out ProPublica’s Dollars for Docs. How does your physician compare with other doctors in the number of tests and services they’ve billed to Medicare? Visit Treatment Tracker.
Grochowski Jones and Ornstein introduced three data sets that can be downloaded from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). These spreadsheets contain information such as nursing home violations and their severity, treatments that doctors billed to Medicare and the breakdown of medical services by race and geography.
Using PivotTables and filters, we practiced searching for dysfunctional nursing homes in our home states. We figured out which doctors in a particular specialty are prescribing the most treatments per number of patients they see.
Watching the worst nursing homes in your area rise to the top with just several clicks of a button is impressive, though slightly disturbing.
“Did we just blow your mind?” Grochowski Jones asked a crowd of impressed journalists.
Here are some of their tips to make data analysis in Excel easier:
While working through a hiccup, Grochowski Jones and Ornstein discovered a new tip from an audience member. Instead of making a brand new PivotTable to reflect the changes you made in your primary spreadsheet, you can refresh your current PivotTable using the “Refresh” button in the pink “Options” tab under “PivotTable Tools.”
“Awesome,” Ornstein said. “We’re learning new things every day.”
“We share, you share,” Grochowski Jones said. “That’s what the NICAR community does every day.”
Jennifer Lu is studying investigative and data journalism at the Missouri School of Journalism.
By Tierra Smith
Correctional facilities tend to document everything. But it can be difficult for journalists to get records from the juvenile justice system because cases and incidents involving minors tend to be confidential.
Chad Day, a reporter for The Associated Press; Kim English of the Colorado Division of Criminal Justice; and Paula Lavigne, a reporter for ESPN, gave tips on how to get information about the juvenile justice system. Ted Gest of the Criminal Justice Journalists moderated the session.
Since there is a higher level of secrecy in the juvenile justice system, journalists must work harder to get the records they want.
Day suggested obtaining blank copies of all forms used by an agency, which will offer clues as to the kinds of information collected. When filing records requests, journalists can then specify the exact information they want using the terminology for particular forms and fields.
Negotiating with agencies to remove identifying information may help journalists get some data faster.
Lavigne advised journalists to seek incident-level data. This can be found in incident reports or logs, offense reports and call or response details. These forms are almost always filled out, even if no arrest is made.
Since many incidents don’t result in arrests or prosecution, this is a great place to start looking for crime patterns. Many sexual assault cases end at this point, too.
Incident reports can be found at the police department, sheriff’s office, state police department and 911 offices.
“You would think that law enforcement and courts are working together when keeping records, but that’s completely not true,” Lavigne said.
Journalists must be willing and able to build their own databases from the information provided by law enforcement.
Lavigne said journalists should know their state’s laws “inside and out,” which will help when negotiating for information.
Tierra Smith is a graduate student at Louisiana State University. She is pursuing a master's in mass communication with plans to finish May 2017.
By Tierra Smith
Data journalists explained the problems they encountered using hacked data during a panel at the 2016 CAR Conference in Denver. Hacking is illegally accessing a computer system that you do not have permission to use.
Not only can the hacker face criminal charges, but journalists could as well. In order to avoid consequences, journalists must use hacked data to serve the public interest.
Nabiha Syed, assistant general counsel for BuzzFeed, said this requires a thoughtful process. Journalists need to determine if the newsworthiness of the data outweighs the risks of using it.
Syed, along with Jack Gillum, a reporter for The Associated Press, and Quinn Norton, an independent journalist, spoke to journalists Friday. Jeremy Singer-Vine, the data editor at BuzzFeed News, moderated the panel.
There are many aspects to consider if journalists want to use hacked data. Journalists should consider the motivation of the hacker and the possibility of tampered data.
How journalists use data will determine the fate of future litigation. The main reason to publish any story from hacked data should be the public interest, Gillum said.
Journalists must also determine what is important to publish from the data. Journalists can get into legal trouble for publishing personal information, such as social security numbers.
Norton said to be cautious about how data is stored. Journalists don’t want to be responsible for hacked data being leaked. If the data is not essential to the story, she suggested that you delete it.
There will be times that you won’t be able to use hacked data. The data may be in a different language that is nearly impossible to translate. Some newsrooms may not have the technology to protect journalists, the company or the data.
Syed also warns not to work with the hacker or ask the hacker to get certain information.
“Don’t go down this road,” she said.
Journalists must receive the data without encouraging hackers. Journalists should not be a part of the data collection process at all. If so, they can be charged with a felony.
Syed also advised that journalists not publish data they haven’t looked at first.
Not all hacked data will be a story, and Norton said that is okay. She suggested that journalists look for several stories within the data, then determine which of those stories service the public interest the most.
Tierra Smith is a graduate student at Louisiana State University. She is pursuing a master's in mass communication with plans to finish May 2017.
By D.B Narveson
Unfortunately, Pinocchio’s nose doesn’t exist.
There is no hard and fast rule to decipher whether someone is lying, and detecting deception depends on the context and your knowledge of the person speaking. But asking your source a lot of questions can help, according to Jeff Hancock, a professor at Stanford University.
Hancock spent years researching how and when people lie in face-to-face interactions and in digital correspondence, finding a few patterns than can also help.
“In face-to-face contact, liars tend to say less overall,” Hancock said. “Online liars say more overall.”
But that’s also a tricky pattern, Hancock said, because people typically lie less in an email than in person.
Often when people are lying, they will decrease their use of first person pronouns. By dropping “I” and “we,” the liar is distancing himself from the lie.
Now this doesn’t always work, Hancock said, but it often holds true. His finding was backed by research digging into statements said by past presidential administrations.
“People often assume that liars will lie more because they can,” Hancock said. “Instead, most people actually prefer to tell the truth.”
Cheryl Phillips, a lecturer at Stanford University, said she encourages reporters to speak with sources multiple ways: in person, on the phone and via email. This provides a written record of what is said should a source be caught in a lie, and provides context for how the source in the story communicates.
Hancock cited research about the results of criminal interrogation techniques in the U.S. and U.K.
In the U.S., interrogations often start with the assumption of guilt and interrogators use terms like, “we know what you did and why,” which can encourage false testimony. In the U.K. the interrogator asks question after question about what happened to get as many details as possible, which can reveal if someone is lying without encouraging false confessions.
Most people want to see themselves as honest people and go between lying when they feel like they need to and lying to the point that they feel they are a dishonest person.
Hancock recommended two books for those wishing to learn more about detecting liars: “Detecting Lies and Deceit: Pitfalls and Opportunities” by Aldert Vrij and “The Honest Truth About Dishonesty: How We Lie to Everyone---Especially Ourselves” by Dan Ariely.
D. B. Narveson is a mass communication senior at Louisiana State University. She is editor of LSUNOW.com and a member of the Manship News Service Statehouse Bureau covering the Louisiana Legislature.
By Jinghong Chen
At this year’s CAR Conference, Peter Aldhous of BuzzFeed News and Alexandra Kanik, a freelance interactive developer, discussed how to design information graphics for the human brain.
Before visualizing data, Aldhous said, “we should think about how our brains process [the charts].”
In the mid-1980s, renowned statisticians William Cleveland and Robert McGrill did several experiments on how accurately human brains can estimate data presented in different visual cues. They found that the order going from accurate to generic is: length(aligned), length, slope/angle, area/color intensity, volume, color hue.
Aldhous explained that human beings are pretty good on relative positions, but poor on color. This reveals tendencies journalists should be aware of in data visualization work.
Journalists are often making charts to visualize change over time. Bar or column charts are commonly used, yet there are other options like column, line, dot-and-line and dot-column charts.
While the column chart helps people compare individual years, line charts emphasize overall time change. The dot-and-line chart combines these two approaches.
In terms of which type of chart to use, the essential question is: what do you want to show?
There are six possible answers: distribution, relationship, comparison, connection, composition (how parts make up the whole) and location.
Color is also an essential element in data visualization. Thinking about colors in terms of the color wheel is very helpful.
There are three types of color schemes that tell different stories: qualitative, sequential and diverging.
When encoding categorical data, qualitative color schemes are good choices. Sequential colors are more commonly used to encode continuous data. Diverging color is for good for data with positive and negative values.
Whenever you’re using colors, it’s important to make sure that people who are colorblind can still understand the charts. Color Oracle, a free simulator, helps present how people with color vision impairments will see the work.
Aldhous also suggests sketching and experimenting with the data. Try different approaches and show your experiments to people. Then see how they process the data.
Kanik also provided some tips on data visualization:
Jinghong Chen is a graduate student at the University of Missouri focusing on data and international journalism.
By Quint Forgey
In our seemingly endless quest to obtain government documents, it’s important to recognize and alleviate the often tense relationships between reporters and public information officers.
During Friday’s panel discussion, “They’ve got it, you want it: Getting data and docs,” Rich Orman, senior deputy district attorney of Colorado’s 18th Judicial District, said bureaucrats are largely terrified of journalists and making a mistake on the record.
Orman said reporters should do their best to put agency workers, such as records custodians, at ease by explaining that the data story in question would be favorable to that agency.
If the agency refuses to turn over the records, however, Jeff Roberts of the Colorado Freedom of Information Coalition urged reporters to threaten to write a story about the difficulty in obtaining the records.
Another strategy for obtaining records is to develop a relationship early on with an elected official at the top of the agency’s hierarchy, Orman said.
“They can clear a lot of logjams,” he said.
When making public records requests, media lawyer Steve Zansberg told attendees to first familiarize themselves with statutes, case laws and the “Open Government Guide,” an online resource for journalists published by the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press.
Turning to a media attorney should be a last resort, Zansberg said.
“We always urge reporters to ask (for the records) first and get a rejection before turning to a lawyer for help,” he said.
Quint Forgey is a junior studying political communication at Louisiana State University. He is the Editor in Chief of his school's award-winning, 129-year-old student newspaper, The Daily Reveille, and a Carnegie-Knight News21 National Reporting Fellow. His work has appeared in The Washington Post.
By Maggie Angst
As a data journalist, it's easy to get immersed in a database and forget the groups and individuals who are affected by the data in the story.
Data can be expansive and intriguing, but what matters most is explaining its real-world impact and relevance on specific people and communities, according to panelists at the “Humanizing numbers” panel at the 2016 CAR Conference.
During the discussion, New York Times reporter Andrew Lehren emphasized that journalists, including data journalists, “don’t tell data, we tell stories.”
Lehren said that often what is most important when humanizing data is finding a source that fits best for the story. Lehren and his investigative team at The New York Times interview dozens of people before finding the person, family, or group of individuals who best fit the focus of a story.
“Don’t just have anecdotes,” Lehren said. “Have people whose story resonates all the way through.”
Kendall Taggart, an investigative reporter at BuzzFeed News, said one of her biggest mistakes as a data journalist tends to be “getting too attached to the data.
More often than not, I am spending too much time in a spreadsheet,” Taggart said. “The stories where I go out and talk to activists or lawyers first work out better. Then I find data to back it up afterwards.
Taggart recommended reporters start with a reporting question rather than a data question. For example, Taggart and her team recently worked on a story about Texas jailing truant students. Her team started with a general inquiry into children facing jail time for unpaid fines. From there, Taggart and her colleagues were informed about a law in Texas that forces some truant students to face jail time.
Once they had the reporting question, the team identified the data and individuals to tell the story. With the data they obtained and information on the truant students, Taggart and her team knocked on doors to interview these students and their families. Although Taggart’s team was able to obtain data on the students fairly easily, Taggart said BuzzFeed “would not have been able to find the real humans without the door knocking.”
Elizabeth Shell, digital editor at CCTV America, also underscored the importance of keeping in mind the individuals affected by the data during the reporting process.
While reporting, Shell said she often reminds herself that although data work tends to be reductive, at the core, she is talking about people.
“These are just people and we are at the liberty to tell their stories,” Shell said.
Shell encourages data journalists to be empathetic. In the end, bringing a human element into your story is not only beneficial for making people care about the issue, but it also aids those victims or groups affected by the issue you’re reporting on.
Maggie Angst is a senior at the University of Missouri studying watchdog convergence journalism, with a minor in business.
Looks like you haven't made a choice yet.
