Journalists request data transparency on Oregon school reopening metrics
On July 28, 2020, Oregon Gov. Kate Brown announced health metrics counties must meet before schools in those counties can open buildings for in-person class.
However, Oregon Health Authority and the Oregon Department of Education didn’t publicly release data showing where counties stood in meeting those metrics until several hours after the press conference, when most education journalists working to inform the public had already filed their stories. The data were also released in a PDF which included only county rates, but not the raw numbers used to calculate them.
A number of Oregon education journalists worked together during the press conference to produce a rough spreadsheet showing where counties stood so we could inform the public in a timely fashion.
SPJ Oregon sent the following letter on July 30 requesting improvements in data transparency and availability going forward, as school reopening metrics will be a key issue for parents, educators, journalists and concerned citizens for months to come.
Governor Brown, Director Allen, Superintendent Gill:
Oregon journalists appreciate your use of clear, data-driven metrics to guide school reopening decisions. We urge you to adopt a transparent, user-friendly approach to communicating with the public and press as you share data going forward. The state’s current practices deny timely, needed information contrary to the spirit and legislative intent of Oregon Public Records Law as summarized by the Oregon Court of Appeals: that "members of the public are entitled to information that will facilitate their understanding of how public business is conducted."
In my capacity as president of the Oregon Territory chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists and an education reporter, I’ve spent a significant amount of time over the past day fielding questions from educators, fellow journalists and members of the public about the metrics being used. A spreadsheet attempting to quantify these metrics, which I created with help from a half dozen other education reporters during Tuesday’s news conference, was shared widely by educators across Oregon, illustrating the need for timely and clear information.
SPJ Oregon members appreciate the OHA dashboard update Wednesday, which includes historical data on the percentage of positive tests by county. Still, we’re dismayed that the agency continues to display critical data for the public using Tableau while disabling options for downloading the data in a machine-readable format.
We write to offer input as you develop methods for monitoring and sharing these metrics. We would be eager to collaborate with you as users of this data to answer questions, share further thoughts or provide feedback as stakeholders.
We request the following:
• OHA should publish data at least weekly that shows where individual counties stand on meeting the new case rates required both to reopen schools and to receive an exception for more limited in-person instruction, such as K-3. Color-coding these rates will assist people in getting a quick picture of where counties stand on meeting metrics.
• ODE should collect and publish data weekly on which schools or school districts are operating in comprehensive distance learning, which are doing limited in-person learning under exemptions and which are holding in-person classes under the Ready Schools, Safe Learners guidance.
• Dr. Sidelinger said Tuesday OHA will exclude prison outbreaks and other outbreaks where community spread is not occurring from case rates when calculating whether schools can reopen. OHA must be clear about which outbreaks are being excluded from totals and how many cases those outbreaks represent.
• Tableau remains a useful tool for visualizing information, but is inadequate for journalists and citizens seeking to download and share data with our readers or add context. At minimum, all Tableau datasets published by OHA should be downloadable in a machine-readable format, such as .csv. Regular publication of data in a spreadsheet format would be preferable, as Tableau’s native download functions are ill-suited to quick analysis and often require significant cleaning to be comprehensible in other formats.
In addition, all data published should include a clear methodology and sourcing, including the following points:
• Raw numbers of new cases being used to calculate the rates of new COVID cases, not merely the rates themselves
• The population numbers OHA is using to calculate rates for each county, and their source
• The maximum number of weekly new cases each county may add without going over the 10 cases per 100,000 population metric
• Clarification of whether and where presumptive cases are included in county totals to calculate these metrics
• Clear indication of any time a county or district is granted the ability to hold in-person schooling despite not meeting all metrics (eg, if numbers can be rounded or rural counties exempted where 1 or 2 new cases puts them over the threshold).
We know government workers face many competing demands and high workloads due to the COVID-19 pandemic. We believe implementing these data-sharing practices will help save time fielding redundant questions and responding to records requests for this information.
Sincerely,
Rachel Alexander
Society of Professional Journalists, Oregon Territory Chapter