project 2

Why Use Visuals?

As you will learn in completing this project, numbers don’t speak for themselves, and writing with

data requires critical and rhetorical thought, as well as visual design skills.

Data visualizations bring a number of benefits to any professional document, even short ones:

• Though they have become extremely easy to make, people in the workplace still tend to

be impressed by the extra effort and thoughtful presentation implicit in making a

visualization.

• Data visualizations also help to make the work of digesting and interpreting data more

efficient by displaying trends or illustrating the significance of specific information without

poring over page after page of numbers.

• Because of this efficiency, visual elements are also better at communicating certain ideas

more quickly than words or tabular data. Something that may take many sentences to

communicate, a sudden drop in the efficiency of a process, or a surge in sales among a

certain demographic, are instantly recognizable as spikes or dips along the X axis of a line

graph.

FOR EXAMPLE:

This short report from the Department of Education Download short report from the Department

of Education provides an overview of literacy and numeracy for men and women. In this online

short report, the authors created two bar charts that are designed to show relationships between

data and then they briefly explain the importance of the data.

However, as previously mentioned, numbers don’t speak for themselves. Integrating visuals comes

with all the benefits listed above, but using visuals also comes with responsibility to use visuals

fairly and justly. Visuals reduce people to numbers, to data, and then, by making a visual using

some data but not other data, you make some people more significant than others. Your visuals

represent a choice to emphasize some facts, and, in so doing, deemphasize others. Your visuals

must be complete and accurate, but also fair and just. When you create your visuals, you should

start with questions such as, “Am I representing the data accurately?” and also, “Am I representing

the data fully and in a way that does no harm to certain groups?”

Assignment

Choose one of the following scenarios and produce a one to two-page, informative, visually

interesting report that uses the dataset provided to address the scenario. This report should

incorporate at least three visuals that you have created along with a discussion/analysis of the

data in your figures.

The text in your report should

• introduce the topic and its importance

• explain the meaning of the visuals

• point to the conclusions suggested by the data.

In working on this project, you will engage with different types of visuals, as well as the

conventions of writing with data and numbers. To achieve these goals, you will select one of the

scenarios listed below. After reviewing the data set provided with the scenario you will do the

following:

1. Identify the purpose (and audience) of the scenario, and then determine what point you

want to make with the dataset and how this addresses the scenario.

2. Then, since you can’t visualize all the data in your data set, you will make decisions about

which data to visualize.

3. Using the data you have selected, you will create three data visualizations to help you

make your point.

4. Then you will write about and analyze that data in a brief, informative, visual report.

In your visuals, you want to communicate the data you select from your data set in a way that

maximizes the impact of the data. Use the textbook chapter on Visual Design (Ch. 5) to help you

design and write about your visuals. Additionally, you may wish to use this Periodic Table of

Visualization Methods (Links to an external site.) to explore various types and uses of visuals.

Deliverables

• Visual, informational report

• A short 350- to 500-word note that explains the following (use headings to identify each

of the topics listed below):

o Why you selected your scenario

o How you selected which data to visualize and why you visualized it in the form you

did

o What decisions you made to tailor your report to your audience and your purpose

o How you ensured that your visualizations of the data were fair, accurate, and clear