Surya Mattu

You can’t fight for justice if you can’t see the injustice. In today’s digital world, injustice lurks in the invisible choices made by algorithms. In order to understand who these algorithms might discriminate against, as well as who they might favor, it is necessary to precisely measure their impacts in the real world, not just in simulations. In this class, you will learn about some fundamental investigative data journalism techniques, by looking into case studies and doing weekly exercises. You will learn the basics about research and reporting strategies that can help you gather evidence and collect data. You will also learn about how to clean dirty data, visualize it, and use it for analysis. These skills are essential to data journalism. We will discuss a range of stories that have relied on them investigating apps that power the gig economy, data brokers that track our online habits and AI-enabled products such as facial recognition software or tenant screening software; to name just a few subjects. Familiarity with research and reporting techniques, and/or experience with scripting languages such as Python or JavaScript will be useful, but are not a requirement.