2025 Data Reporting & Visualization (All Newsroom Sizes) Finalists
Liz Bowie, Greg Morton, Ryan Little & Allan James Vestal
The Baltimore Banner
Missing the Bus: How Baltimore Failed a Generation of Students Struggling to Get to School
- Transit nightmare: Thousands of Baltimore kids can’t get to school on time
- Which Baltimore school is best for you? Compare routes using this tool.
- School buses for every Baltimore student seemed impossible — until now
Comments From the Judges:
“An outstanding project. These stories clearly document how students often suffer from failure of Baltimore city transit and school systems to provide reliable, safe transportation options. The data work is ambitious, on target, and well explained. Good context, comparison to other school districts, and background; and good accountability coverage. The student sketches and photos put readers there.”
“A huge undertaking to delve into an oft-overlooked element of education — how kids get to and from school. The interactive maps and data visualizations are easy to navigate, creatively presented and effective in making a big issue very tangible for the reader. They’re also easy to navigate and helpful for parents and students. Then, the journalists didn’t stop when city and school officials said the problem was too big to fix; instead, they came forth with a story about tailored solutions. Really great work all around.”
Lauren Weber, Caitlin Gilbert, Dylan Moriarty & Joshua Lott
The Washington Post
U.S. Vaccination Rates Are Plunging. Look up Where Your School Stands.
Comments From the Judges:
“This is an impressive, large-scale project for a news organization of any size. Ambitious data collection and clear methodology; telling photographs; graphics that efficiently showcase overall trends as well as neighborhood facts; authoritative reporting and clear writing; examples that put a reader on the ground.”
“The data visualizations are gorgeous, complex, yet accessibly informative. The variety of graphics provided were engaging and cohesive, specifically across the range of regions highlighted within the article (Minneapolis, Detroit, Chicago, and Seattle). The pre-pandemic vs post-pandemic vaccination rate map across the United States was incredibly effective at illustrating the current shifts in vaccination rates and how the majority of the country is now at risk of failing recommended herd immunity status.”
Yuxuan (Sunny) Xie, Justin Allen, Daniel J. Willis & Karen D’Souza
EdSource
Falling Rates, Rising Risk: Vaccination Rates Down in California
- California School Vaccinations Database: Find out how many students are vaccinated at your school
- Amid deadly measles outbreak, California’s childhood vaccination rates are falling
Comments From the Judges:
“Great community resource, published and shared at a timely moment and combined with strong storytelling and easily digestible data visualizations. This is really useful local reporting. Nicely done. Nice colors. Easy to follow.”
“In its tables and graphics, this project provides detailed, accessible, present and historical vaccination rates for thousands of California schools, and valuable context with summaries for types of schools and for counties. Its text tells the story of changing attitudes, giving voice to vaccine skeptics and to school health officials. Well done.”
