How Many Ways Can We Teach Data Literacy

It is said that academic libraries are in ideal positions for teaching data literacy. But what is “data literacy”? Is it the new information literacy? Will the ways we teach information literacy limit our imagination of teaching data literacy? How “literate” should we, librarians and technologists, be in order to teach others data literacy? With those questions in mind, the Library of New York University Shanghai have been exploring multiple ways to teach data literacy through university events, classroom instructions, and online casebooks. (1) We initiated the yearlong event “Lying with Data” Series, inviting faculty across disciplines to each address one core data literacy question that may elude students. Topics include how to view graphs skeptically, getting the truth out of opinion surveys, understanding causal inference versus correlation, and blind spots in machine learning. (2) We offered workshops and in-class instructions that are both up-to-date with the latest technology and that fit with the curriculum. (3) We created online casebooks on various topics in the data life cycle, tackling user needs at levels of “introductory topics,” “coding smartly,” and “project-based cases.” Essential to our teaching activities are two core messages: “let the quality speak for itself” and “outreaching by teaching.