Category Archives: charts

When looking at a chart, a sharper increase in slope automatically assumes more progress in whatever the graph is showing to a reader. The extreme increase connotes more progress over time because it appears to be climbing more rapidly; depending … Continue reading → Continue reading →

To lie about the statistics, I altered the minimum and maximum of the Y-axis to portray the data in a way that would make it appear drastically different from what a simple data table—or an appropriately scaled graph—would portray to the … Continue reading → Continue reading →

To create the following two graphs, I first extracted data from the “Actual and Legal Progress toward Sheff I Goal, 2003-2007″ chart featured as Figure 5.1 in Dougherty’s Sheff v. O’Neill: Weak Desegration Remedies and Strong Disincentives in Connecticut, 1996-2008. In … Continue reading → Continue reading →

It is important to understand how data is reported to exaggerate different results in either positive or negative ways. Using the data from the Sheff I settlement below, I created two line graphs that incorporates the same data, but I … Continue reading → Continue reading →

In Dougherty et al. “Sheff v O’Neill: Weak Desegregation Remedies,” the following data is given to show the progress toward the Sheff I  goal during in the years 2003-2007. When plotted on a line chart, the data can show a progression either … Continue reading → Continue reading →

Data can easily be skewed in order to prove or disprove a point or area of research. When looking at progress towards the Sheff I goal, information portrayed in a graph can be situated to look like schools are making … Continue reading → Continue reading →

If you have ever looked at a chart, you probably made assumptions about what exactly it was telling you, according to what it looked like. By manipulating the scales of the x and y axis, charts that display the same … Continue reading → Continue reading →

Different types of graphs, with different scales, can portray the same set of data in many different ways.  These three images show how one can take the same information but use it in different ways in order to convince people … Continue reading → Continue reading →

Anyone who has ever played the game Two Truths and a Lie knows that telling another person three things about yourself and deliberately lying about one of them is easy, and fun, to do. The same goes for statistics. Those … Continue reading → Continue reading →

This post is about manipulations of statistics in terms of how they are presented. In this case, data was drawn from Jack Dougherty, Jesse Wanzer ’08, and Christina Ramsay ’09. “Sheff v. O’Neill: Weak Desegregation Remedies and Strong Disincentives in Connecticut, 1996-2008.” In From the Courtroom to the Classroom: The Shifting Landscape of School Desegregation, edited [...] Continue reading →

This post is about manipulations of statistics in terms of how they are presented. In this case, data was drawn from Jack Dougherty, Jesse Wanzer ’08, and Christina Ramsay ’09. “Sheff v. O’Neill: Weak Desegregation Remedies and Strong Disincentives in … Continue reading → Continue reading →