The main contact for Plings in each Local Authority taking part in the pilot will shortly be receiving a log-in to the Plings Stats tool.
The statistics tool is our way of helping Local Authorities to review what their local offer really looks like – by navigating the activity offer contained within the Plings database.
As you can see from the screen-shot below, the tool will allow authorities to pick any date-range and explore what activities were on offer then, of what sort, and by run by which providers.
The Plings Statistics Tool
Knowing more about the activities currently on offer can help local authorities to identify gaps in provision.
This is the first public release of the statistics tool, but we will continue to develop it over the coming year – exploring ways that the statistical information on what is on when, can be complemented with feedback and comments from young people about local activity provision.
If you’ve got ideas for developing the stats tool, then of course, do let us know.
I’ve just be sent a link to this great 5 min video: Chart Wars: The Political Power of Data Visualization – http://bit.ly/7W3hYM
As one of the people behind the Stats tool, I thought this talk was particularly good.
With the tool, we’re trying to make it easy for people to understand large data sets, and as such, much of the ‘power’ behind the presentation is in our hands. We decide what data to present, and how to present it (e.g. using a pie chart or a line chart).
The talk reminds us how we need to look critically at such data visualisations and sometimes how we have to work out what the picture is really telling us. (I often have to do this just to check that the graph is showing me what I expected it to as I coded it!)
I hope that as people start to use the tools, we’ll start getting questions about what we’re doing, how we’re doing it and why, as people become engaged in understanding their data.
I like the comment in the talk that “pie charts suck”!
Pingback: Plings - Blog - Blackpool Plings By Numbers