GIJN Masterclass Round-Up: Data Journalism

GIJN’s Global Academy is your gateway to investigative journalism training. Through masterclass videos, training programs (in person or online), webinars or mentorship programs, the Academy helps journalists at every stage strengthen their investigative skills, connect with peers, and continue learning. In this post, we’ve gathered some of our recent expert masterclass videos that tackle different aspects of using data in your investigations.

Data Journalism Basics

In this masterclass video, Fabiola Torres, founder and director of Salud con Lupa, shares a practical approach to data journalism, starting not with tools, but with documents.

She explains how investigations often begin with access to information requests, and how journalists must build their own datasets from messy, fragmented sources like PDFs. Using simple tools like spreadsheets and keyword searches, she shows how to organize, analyze, and extract insights from large volumes of information.

This grounded, hands-on guide cuts through the hype to help: master the basics, trust your reporting instincts, and turn raw data into impactful investigations.

Credits:

• Interview: Sarah Ulrich
• Video Editing: Quentin Egloff
• Music: Lionel Marçal
• Filming: Ron Lopez, Reynald Ramirez, Hashim Hakeem
• Supervision and Coordination: Sandrine Rigaud
• Special Thanks: Glenn Chong
• With the support of The Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung

Spreadsheets for Investigative Journalists

In this masterclass video, Helena Bengtsson, the data journalism editor at Gota Media and Bonnier News Local (two regional publishing companies in Sweden with 55 local titles), shares essential spreadsheet skills every journalist needs to tell impactful stories.

She explains how spreadsheets serve two core purposes in the newsroom: putting individual tips into context to produce better-reported stories and structuring information in a way that reveals the story itself.

Bengtsson walks through the five key techniques journalists should master: sorting to find the biggest numbers, filtering to isolate relevant data, performing simple calculations, building pivot tables to summarize large datasets and surface errors, and connecting multiple spreadsheets to compare data across sources. She also shows how combining two datasets (such as a list of politicians and a list of companies holding government contracts) can be a powerful method for detecting corruption.

Credits:

• Interview: Sarah Ulrich
• Video Editing: Quentin Egloff
• Music: Lionel Marçal
• Filming: Ron Lopez, Reynald Ramirez, Hashim Hakeem
• Supervision and Coordination: Sandrine Rigaud
• Special Thanks: Glenn Chong
• With the support of the Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung

Investigating with Satellite Images

In this masterclass video, Laura Kurtzberg, training director at IRE and freelance data journalist, explains everything you need to know about using satellite images in your investigations.

Kurtzberg shares her knowledge on why satellite images can help with many different story types far beyond environmental stories. The teacher and journalist shows various free tools and how you can use them. You’ll also learn how you can leverage satellite images to not only analyze, but also to visualize your investigation and to paint an understandable picture for your audience.

Resources / tools mentioned in this video:

• Copernicus: https://browser.dataspace.copernicus.eu/
• QGIS: https://qgis.org/
• GIJN: https://gijn.org/resource/how-to-acqu…
• Data visualization: https://flourish.studio/

Credits:

• Interview: Sarah Ulrich
• Video Editing: Quentin Egloff
• Music: Lionel Marçal
• Filming: Ron Lopez, Reynald Ramirez, Hashim Hakeem
• Supervision and Coordination: Sandrine Rigaud
• Special Thanks: Glenn Chong
• With the support of The Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung