How Do Data Journalists Use Excel?

This article will take a closer look at the field of data journalism, as well as the role Excel plays in the information-gathering and visualizing process.

What is Data Journalism?

In 2022, nearly everything can be described using numbers and data. It’s even possible to use data to tell a story. Unlike traditional journalism, the field of data journalism relies on the available digital data and information to report on news and timely events. This can involve various tools and techniques such as using programming to automate the act of collecting information from civic, government, and law enforcement sources, or using software to make connections between thousands of documents.

Data journalism offers Journalists new ways to weave together complicated stories. Infographics, as well as charts, maps, and graphs, are often involved, which provide accessible visualizations of data findings. This form of reporting may also leverage techniques such as taking big numbers like public spending budgets and putting them into the context of other values to provide readers with a relatable frame of reference. Data Journalism can also paint the picture of how a story relates to individuals, or even shed meta-insights into the process involved with gathering the facts.

Also known as data storytelling, the main goal of data journalism is to transform complex datasets into concise narrative stories that are accessible to a broad, non-technical audience. This form of journalism provides a structured approach to communicating data-driven insights. It relies on three main elements to accomplish this goal:

• Data
• Visuals that enlighten audience members about insights that may otherwise not be noticed
• A narrative that explains the data

When these three elements are brought together, the resulting piece has the potential not only to engage or entertain audience members but can also fuel change. It has been found that data can influence how an audience perceives a topic, and can particularly affect audience members who find value in scientific methods. Along with this ability to influence comes additional responsibility for the Data Journalist to use the necessary tools and programs to find accurate and meaningful data, and present it in a way that has narrative drive.

Components of Successful Data Journalism

Telling a good data-driven story is not an easy task. Data Journalists must wear several hats to convey information in a manner that can reach audience members. They must

• Tell relevant stories. The most successful stories are those that are timely and connect to the audience.
• Use good data. Any data that’s included in a story should come from a reputable source. Data Journalists draw from publicly available data from places such as academic organizations, reputable researchers, or government organizations. This not only ensures that the data is accessible, but also that it’s transparent and can be verified. Because data is the center of these stories, their focus should be on the objective data rather than what the writer thinks the audience needs to hear.
• Use helpful visuals. Data visualizations such as charts created in Excel, provide a visual braid to the narrative that can complement the material.
• Present a clear narrative. Just like traditional storytelling, a good story has an arc with a beginning, middle, and end. Data stories tend to follow a similar pattern. They introduce the topic before moving on to the data. Often, they conclude with a call to action. They tell the story with clear, straightforward language that is free of jargon or confusing word choices.

How Do Data Journalists Use Excel?

Microsoft Excel is a versatile and practical tool that can help Data Journalists handle data-driven tasks such as managing large datasets and uncovering patterns from the data. The following are several examples of Excel tools, functions, and features that have applications in the field of data journalism:

• Sorting. By sorting the data within an Excel worksheet, a more revealing order often emerges, which can indicate various extreme values such as the largest, smallest, most, least, best, or worst. These values provide Data Journalists with important information and reliable information pertaining to trends, patterns, or outliers, which can be used to add credibility or proof to reporting.

• Filtering. This tool is useful when a Data Journalist needs to study one portion of data from a larger collection. The Filter tool has applications for examining particular records or records in which two variables are present such as instances when the population is greater than one million and the rate of homicide is less than 20. Filtering data in a worksheet saves Data Journalists a significant amount of time that would be required to manually examine the numbers.

• Data visualizations. Most people retain information better when it’s presented in a visual format. Data visualizations can provide accessible and engaging depictions of complicated data, and shed insights into trends and patterns within the dataset that may not be otherwise detectable. Visualizations tend to answer a specific question about data and can be used to indicate any correlations between variables or trends over time. The following are some of the data visualizations Data Journalists can select from when using Excel:

• Scatter plots
• Area charts
• Histograms
• Pie charts
• Bar charts
• Heat maps
• Gantt charts
• Highlight maps
• Bullet graphs
• Timelines

• Functions. Excel includes a variety of built-in functions for executing calculations on data. Data Journalists could perform functions to calculate important statistics such as the number of murders in a given location per 100,000 residents. This number could then be compared to the murder rate in larger or smaller cities. 

• PivotTables. This Excel feature helps Data Journalists organize or rearrange data on the spot. PivotTables are also helpful for filtering and summarizing data so that conclusions can be immediately displayed. In particular, PivotTables can be used to find answers to:

• Comparative questions such as which kind of car sold the best in 2021.
• Quantitative analyses such as how many people have purchased a Toyota in 2021.
• Relationships between various variables such as patterns in datasets pertaining to car sales in the U.S. in 2021.

Get Started Learning Excel with Hands-On Classes

A great way to learn more about how to use Excel to collect, organize, and visualize data is to enroll in one of Noble Desktop’s Excel courses in NYC and live online. Courses are available for those who are new to Excel, as well as learners who regularly work with this spreadsheet application and wish to brush up on their skills. In addition, there are also in-person and live online Excel courses available through Noble Desktop or one of its affiliate schools. A variety of course options are offered, ranging in duration from three hours to two days and costing between $229 and $1,099. 

Noble Desktop’s Excel Bootcamp provides a great option for those who want to master core Excel concepts such as working with VLOOKUP and PivotTables, as well as performing What-If Analysis. Students who enroll in this rigorous, 21-hour course can elect to study in-person in Manhattan or learn in the live online environment. This small class comes with the option of a free retake and covers a variety of Excel concepts applicable to the business world. 

Those interested in studying Excel close to home can also browse over 140 in-person Microsoft Excel classes to find nearby study options. Courses are available that vary in duration from three hours to five days, and range in price from $110-$8,749.