Data Literacy Teaching Toolkit

The ability to think critically and communicate about data is an essential skill for engineers. Students need to evaluate datasets, connect data to appropriate statistical tools, and communicate data to a wide range of audiences. They need to be data literate.

At the University of South Florida, a Communications faculty member collaborated with library faculty to redesign the data literacy module (20%) that is a required component of the introductory probability and statistics course for undergraduate engineering students.

Dr. Sheila Gobes-Ryan and Theresa Burress presented their case study at the 2025 American Society of Engineering Educators meeting. A link to the conference paper and poster will be forthcoming. Below is a list of data visualization resources that informed their approach, with asterisks indicating the most heavily used resources:

Duarte, N. (2019). Data story: Explain data and inspire action through story. Ideapress.

Duquia, R.P., J. L. Bastos, R. R. Bonamigo, D. A. González-Chica, and J. Martínez-Mesa, “Presenting Data in Tables and Charts,” An Bras Dermatol, vol. 89, no. 2, pp. 280–285, Apr. 2014, doi: 10.1590/abd1806-4841.20143388

Dykes, B. (2020). Effective data storytelling: How to drive change with data, narrative, and visuals. Wiley.

*Few, S. (2012). Show me the numbers: Designing tables and graphs to enlighten, 2^nd ed. Analytics Press.

*Few, S. (2019). The data loom: Weaving Understanding by thinking critically and scientifically with data. Analytics Press.

Few, S. (2021). Now you see it: An introduction to visual data sensemaking. Analytics Press.

Kazakoff, M. (2022). Persuading with data: A guide to designing, delivering, and defending your data. The MIT Press.

Nussbaumer Knaflic, C. (2015). Storytelling with data: A data visualization guide for business professionals. Wiley.

Nussbaumer Knaflic, C. (2020). Storytelling with data: Let’s practice. Wiley.

Peck, R. (2005). “There’s More to Statistics than Computation—Teaching Students How to Communicate Statistical Results,” in Proceedings of the IASE Satellite Conference on Statistics Education and the Communication of Statistics, Voorburg: International Statistical Institute, 2005, pp. 1–4.

Schwabish, J. (2021) Better data visualizations: A guide for scholars, researchers, and wonks. Columbia University Press.

Tufte, E. R. (1990). Envisioning information. Graphics Press.

Tufte, E. R. (2001). The visual display of quantitative information, 2nd ed. Graphics press.

Tufte, E. R. (2006). Beautiful evidence. Graphics Press.

This study built on our earlier work exploring faculty perspectives by investigating the data practices of students who completed undergraduate  research projects via mixed methods study. The findings further affirmed the great extent to which undergraduate students work with data across a  range of disciplines:

Burress, T. (2022a). Data Literacy Practices of Students Conducting Undergraduate Research. College & Research Libraries, 83(3). https://crl.acrl.org/index.php/crl/article/view/24740/33320

Just as information literacy can be integrated across the curriculum, data literacy can be integrated into a variety of courses and disciplines. USF St. Petersburg campus faculty investigated data literacy as part of a 2018-19 faculty learning community. The work done by this faculty learning community was presented and published as follows:

Burress, T., Cassill, D., Ivey, J., Janssens, R. J., Mantilla, F., Mbatu, R., Natali, S., Neville, T., & Wang, K. (2019, February). Faculty Learning Community: Data Literacy [poster presentation]. 4th Annual Bay-to-Bay Learning Symposium.

Burress, T., Mann, E., & Neville, T. (2020). Exploring data literacy via a librarian-faculty learning community: A case study. Journal of Academic Librarianship, 46(1), 102076. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.acalib.2019.102076

Cross-institutional qualitative research conducted by librarians from Rollins College and USF's St. Petersburg campus affirmed that many data-related competencies are critical for undergraduate students. Research findings have been published as follows:

Burress, T., Mann, E. Z., Walton, R., & Montgomery, S. (2020). Data Literacy Competencies for Undergraduates: Exploring Faculty Perspectives and Librarian Liaison Opportunities. 2020 SE Data Librarian Symposium [Virtual].

Burress, T., Mann, E., Montgomery, S., & Walton, R. (2021). Data literacy in undergraduate education: Faculty perspectives and pedagogical approaches. In Teaching Critical Thinking with Numbers. American Library Association. https://digitalcommons.usf.edu/fac_publications/4121/

The revised undergraduate data literacy competencies with disciplinary scaffolding may be used as a guide to help faculty and librarians integrate data-related skills into undergraduate courses in a variety of disciplines.