The State of Education

Data Journalism Web Interface – 2021

This data visualization shows how states spend money on public education and the potential influence of wealth in education. The data is displayed in context to other states using bars to represent comparative percentages in each category. The map design was inspired by the periodic table of elements, using square cells to give each state equal visual real estate.

The original hypothesis was that more spending and wealth would create better public school performance and outcomes. While mostly true, states like New York, California, and Alaska are near the top in many categories regarding spending and wealth, but they are all in the bottom half of the K-12 ranking. There are many other socio-economic, political, and geographic factors that are not present in the data to make a clear conclusion.