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IRE Journal
AUDIO: Using data to cover hazmat pollution
By Hannah Schmidt Journalists Denise Malan, Ben Poston and Tim Wheeler all used data to create stories on hazardous materials and the environment. The three discussed state and national databases that track pollution and hazardous waste at the NICAR Conference in Baltimore. NICAR offers a hazardous waste database. Malan described how to use it and what…
Read MoreAUDIO: Alberto Cairo on the next generation of data viz
[View the story “Highlights: The next generation of data viz” on Storify]
Read MoreListen to audio clips from ‘Detecting corporate fraud’
[View the story “Detecting Corporate Fraud Workshop Highlights” on Storify]
Read MoreReporter finds hundreds of unpunished water violations in Minnesota
By Mark Steil, Minnesota Public Radio I’ve always enjoyed looking through large piles of data in my job as a reporter for Minnesota Public Radio. My primary beats are the agriculture and energy sectors. I’ve been on the job 35 years now, and for most of that time a document hunt generally meant one thing:…
Read MoreBehind the Story: America’s Woman Warriors
Staff Sgt. Jessica Keown, with the 3rd Brigade, 1st Armored Division at Fort Bliss in El Paso Texas, served with a female engagement team, or FET, in Afghanistan. David Gilkey/NPR From the time NPR corresondent Quil Lawrence spent in Iraq before covering veterans issues, he could tell women in the military were doing more than…
Read MoreNational: Home in on top donors, bundlers, super PACs
By Viveca Novak Center for Responsive Politics The 2012 election promises to be the most expensive on record. One important way in which it differs from the 2008 contest: the presence of more outside groups, spending much more money, thanks to the Supreme Court’s opinion in Citizens United v. FEC in 2010 and subsequent legal…
Read MoreCampaign cash flow at the state level: Look at contributors, ballot measures
By Beverly Magley and Anne Sherwood, National Institute on Money in State Politics For your stories about 2012 state elections, check out free campaign-finance information at The National Institute on Money in State Politics (followthemoney.org), a nonpartisan not-for-profit organization. In addition to downloadable data sets, you can mine reports on trends and anomalies, as well…
Read More2011 IRE Investigative Books List
IRE’s annual list of investigative books can be viewed here and seen below. More than 200 books published in 2011 made the list. The annual list is compiled by Steve Weinberg. If you know of an investigative/explanatory book written by an American journalist published last year for public sale and fail to see it listed, please…
Read MoreCrimes in the classroom
By Susan Snyder and Dylan Purcell, The Philadelphia Inquirer A series of racial attacks at a Philadelphia high school in late 2009 – and the school district’s inadequate response – prompted The Inquirer to launch an investigation into school violence. Its seven-part series, “Assault on Learning“, and follow-up stories published throughout the past year, showed that…
Read MoreFrom the IRE Office: Awards, website change with the times
This is a season of evolution at IRE We have rebuilt our IRE Awards categories to better reflect the ways in which news is gathered and presented. And we have launched a new website that is easier to navigate, makes it easier for you to take advantage of our resources and gives you more control over…
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