ICPSR Supports New Bipartisan Data Literacy Legislation
Dear friends,
The Data Science and Literacy Act of 2023 was introduced on Feb. 14, 2023, by US Representatives Haley Stevens (D-MI), Jim Baird (R-IN), Don Beyer (D-VA), and Young Kim (R-CA). Rep. Stevens provides a summary of the proposed legislation.
The act supports a voluntary program at the Department of Education through which educational entities (from elementary to two- and four-year colleges) can apply for funding to increase access to data science and literacy education. Specifically, grant funding can be used for the following:
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Preparing and supporting teachers to develop students’ ability to make sense of data and implement it in problem-solving.
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Development of data literacy, data science, and statistics curricula.
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Expanding access to support and high-quality learning materials.
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Creating plans for expanding overall access to and support within rigorous STEM classes and reducing course equity gaps for all students.
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Ensuring additional support and resources for students from populations traditionally underrepresented in STEM fields.
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Providing evidence-based professional development for current data science and statistics educators, or training for current educators seeking to transition into data science education.
ICPSR strongly supports this proposed legislation. For its entire sixty years, ICPSR has linked data access to data literacy. We preserve and disseminate data, and we teach people how to manage and analyze data. Data access can only improve our understanding of the world in which we live if people have the skills to analyze that data and to understand the analyses undertaken by others. Data literacy is critical to both economic innovation and a vibrant democracy. ICPSR has signed on to the letter supporting this legislation. I urge you to do so as well (by completing this form), and to communicate with others the value of this legislation and training in data literacy more generally.
Sincerely,
Margaret C. Levenstein
Director, Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research
Mar 9, 2023