{
  "id": "1996-september-count-me-in",
  "slug": "1996-september-count-me-in",
  "url": "https://dwillis.github.io/uplink/article/1996-september-count-me-in.html",
  "year": 1996,
  "month": "September",
  "monthNum": 9,
  "headline": "Count me in",
  "kicker": "CAR Trips: First ventures",
  "author_name": "Maureen Smith",
  "author_title": "Reporter",
  "affiliation": "The Minneapolis Star Tribune",
  "summary": "The Minneapolis Star Tribune education team successfully used spreadsheets on a tight deadline to analyze and compare eighth-grade test scores across 300 school districts.",
  "keywords": [
    "test scores",
    "Quattro Pro",
    "deadline reporting"
  ],
  "topics": [
    "Investigative Methods",
    "Education",
    "Data & Databases"
  ],
  "technologies": [
    "Quattro Pro",
    "spreadsheet",
    "Email"
  ],
  "full_text": "The next time you think about crunching numbers with a calculator, think again. The education team at the Minneapolis Star Tribune walked into the land of computer-assisted reporting much like a nomad would wander into the forest: equipped with survival skills and resourceful minds, but little technical know-how. And we were more comfortable with calculators than computers. But we got over it. On deadline. It this summer. Our five-reporter-and-one-editor-team was strategizing around noon about the news to come: a breaking test score story. All we knew was that later in the afternoon, we'd have the test scores of scads of Minnesota eighth graders on new state-wide tests in math and reading. Comparing school districts: We already knew that fewer students passed the basic skills tests than hoped or expected. What grabbed our curiosity was how districts compared. By 3 p.m., a reporter came back armed with stacks of blue sheets of paper- one for each of about 300 school districts. Each blue sheet had the name of the district, the number of students who took the math and reading tests. But instead of telling us what percentage passed and failed, each sheet broke the students into six score categories that didn't neatly add up. The bottom line was that we had to do the math ourselves. Then began the debate: Should we use calculators, which we all knew how to use, or those unfathomable computer spreadsheets? Our education editor, Maureen McCarthy, bargained on the risk. Fortunately, Bill Loving, since named CAR director, happened to be within earshot. 'Hey Bill, do you think we could do this on a spreadsheet?' Loving and I sat down and I learned how to use Quattro Pro while we set up the spreadsheet. Another reporter prepared four others for data entry. It was going on 3:30 p.m. as I agonized over figuring out the formula for percentage and finding the formatting command for a percentage column. Meanwhile, three teams of two people each entered a stack of raw data: One read it, the other typed it in the computer. Each group also proofread their data entry list once. By about 5 p.m., we had three lists of school districts and merged them together into a common spreadsheet that summarized the percentage of students who passed and failed at each district. Despite some technical obstacles between reporter's PCs and graphics Macintosh layout system, we found a way to send the whole spreadsheet through e-mail. Graphics artist Mark Boswell cleaned up the data and made a chart. And we learned that obvious lesson in CAR-land: Computers work and think faster, better, and more efficiently than calculators.",
  "provenance": {
    "extracted_by": "pre-v2",
    "extracted_at": "",
    "verified": true
  },
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      "slug": "2006-july-august-finding-diamonds-in-the-rough",
      "score": 0.254
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  ],
  "html_url": "https://dwillis.github.io/uplink/article/1996-september-count-me-in.html",
  "json_url": "https://dwillis.github.io/uplink/article/1996-september-count-me-in.json"
}