Database journalism, also known as computer assisted reporting (CAR), is an increasingly important tool that enables journalists to add depth to their stories by accessing, making sense and presenting government, financial, and social statistics.
Our datajournalism courses are listed below, for all our training events, please see the Course Calendar.
30 March – City University London Course fees – £25, students only.
Book your place now via this online booking form. Find out more information.
14-18 March – City University London. Course fees – £250-£500.
Book your place now via this online booking form or find out more information.
3-7 October – City University London. Course fees – £250-£500.
Book your place now via this online booking form or find out more information.
What You’ll Learn
Data is everywhere – from government computers to websites. Digging in institutional databases can take your investigative skills to a new level. Our datajournalism courses are designed to show you techniques used to find stories hidden within any data set. This course will teach you how to use Microsoft Excel or Google Docs to find story ideas or to provide more depth and context and thus enhance your reporting. You will be shown the basics of finding, basic web-scraping and cleaning data to advanced techniques such as searching data for journalistic purposes. You will also learn basic calculations, rates, ratios and analytic tools that generate story ideas. Most courses are suitable for beginners as well as practising journalists who want to be able to work on their own data stories or futher their data skills.
But Don’t Just Take Our Word For It!
“I attended the October 2011 Data Journalism Boot Camp with very little experience of Excel. David Donald’s excellent teaching, patience and his ability to make statistics sound fascinating meant I left the course confident and keen to handle large volumes of data. A few months later, the investigative news website I work for partnered with BBC Northern Ireland to publish my first big data story. My analysis was based on 14,259 rows in Excel. Before the training, I wouldn’t have known where to start! Thanks to David and the CIJ, I have been bitten by the data bug and regularly have dreams about pie charts.”
Kathryn Torney, senior journalist at The Detail (www.thedetail.tv) in Belfast.
Jailed for non-payment of fines in Northern Ireland
Thousands imprisoned for minor crimes
Please note: All courses are subject to cancellation if a minimum number of delegates required to cover costs of trainers and venue where relevant, cannot be met. If you are booking train tickets or similar, please do get in touch before confirming your travel plans. For any questions, please email minal@tcij.org or ring the office on 020 7040 8220.