As an enthusiastic member of  nationwide team of educators, I successfully developed and implemented strategies to help high school students become more critical and confident users of data. By collaboratively exploring student misconceptions, experimenting with cross-curricular approaches, and integrating real-world datasets, the team empowered students to move beyond cherry-picked statistics and surface-level infographics. Our work resulted in practical, equity-focused tools that support students in analyzing, questioning, and creating data-rich content—skills essential for navigating today's information landscape.

Products of the effort:

• The 4T Virtual Conference on Data Literacy, a pair of free online conferences for high school librarians and educators (and, as we discovered, over 80 other types of professionals!). In 2016 and 2017, topics included data and voting, basic statistics strategies, sources of raw data, infographics creation, citizen science as a pro-social use of Big Data, personal data management, and more.​
• Creating Data Literate Students, our experts unpacked their experiences navigating data with high schoolers. Chapters ranged from a discussion of the most valuable statistical strategies to teach to how to create engaging infographic units to how to find data and conduct basic analysis with Microsoft Excel.
• Data Literacy in the Real World: Conversations & Case Studies, containing two kinds of professional development tools, Part I contains pre-made professional development via links to webinars from the 2016 and 2017 4T Virtual Conference on Data Literacy, along with discussion questions and activities that can animate conversations around data in your school. Part II explores data “in the wild” with case studies pulled from the headlines, along with provocative discussion questions, professionals and students alike can explore multiple perspectives at play with Big Data, data privacy, personal data management, ethical data use, and citizen science. 

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