Amanda Kleintop and Cora Wigger

Amanda Kleintop, assistant professor of history, and Cora Wigger, assistant professor of economics, are the 2025-2027 CEL Scholar (joint appointment). Together, they will focus on advancing data literacy in engaged learning and developing interdisciplinary resources to help faculty and students critically analyze and apply data across fields.

Graphic representation of data upload icons on computer with quote: "Collected data is almost always a reflection of what is valued in some way by the data collectors.”

Purpose-Driven Data 

My first career after college was as the Data Manager for a nonprofit in Kentucky that provided services to survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault. As an overly ambitious 23-year-old, I was the inaugural holder of that title and…

Quote: "Without historical source analysis, students would not see that data is only as reliable as the people who create and interpret it into new forms." with redlined map in background.

Where History and Economics Collide: Teaching on Redlining 

Though the use of data for analysis is often framed as a way of answering questions about the world, it also helps us come up with new questions, questions more aligned to the mysteries that drive us to ask questions in the first place. We (Amanda and Cora)…

"As concepts become more abstract, reaching agreement on appropriate measurement strategies becomes more difficult." -Cora Wigger

Defining and Measuring 

This semester, I’ve been working with two wonderful students doing mentored research projects of their own design. As they’ve been developing their research questions, I am reminded fondly of an exercise I did in a research methods class during grad school.   The professor, Dr. Ellen Goldring,…

"Instead of separating AI literacy and data literacy, we see data literacy as a key precursor to AI literacy." -Cora Wigger

Data Literacy as a Precursor to AI Literacy 

As the new school year begins and our weeks are filled with slide edits, planning meetings, and the smell of new notebooks, one theme is dominating the preparation: Artificial Intelligence. I am not an AI expert. I have no tips…

"There were a host of lessons to be learned about what it means to engage in equitable and engaged teaching of data literacy." -Amanda Kleintop & Cora Wigger

Engaging Students in Transcribing Historical Data: About the Project 

In this post and a series of student contributions that follow, we describe a summer project where we engaged with students doing transcription work of historical archival documents. While the original conception of the project started off as purely oriented…