Project will give public better access to public information
 
Here at I-News, an important part of our mission is to turn complex data and information into compelling journalism people can use to make decisions in a democracy.
We’re thrilled to announce that we are joining with the Piton Foundation and The Denver Foundation in a project that will help us do even more of that. And today, we can announce that the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation’s Community Information Challenge has awarded the project $336,000, a challenge grant that will …

In a 10-month investigation, the I-News Network and Education News Colorado found online K-12 schools get millions in state tax dollars while their students fall further behind.
We filed public records requests for internal documents, analyzed previously unreleased state education data, and interviewed lawmakers, educators, experts, parents and students. What we found was big business with little state oversight and dismal performance.
Read the series here:
Part 1: Half of online K-12 students leave, but virtual schools keep millions in tax dollars.
Part 2: Online schools produce three dropouts for every graduate, and …

Here at I-News, we feel like we’ve been awarded the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval.
In just the past week, I’ve had two conversations with individuals who are interested in helping I-News sustain quality, in-depth journalism in Colorado. When I told them our current supporters include The Denver Foundation, it was as if I’d said the magic words.

I-News received a $5,000 grant from The Denver Foundation this year. We appreciate the funding (do we ever!). But just as valuable – and likely even more so in the long-run – is the …

Thousands of Colorado school children are behind in math, reading, writing and science – and they might never catch up.
This week, I-News helped our media partners throughout Colorado tell the story.
I-News analyzed data from the Colorado Student Assessment Program for our media partners.The CSAP data are thousands of numbers that show how students in grades 3 through 10 perform in reading, writing, math and science. I-News boiled the numbers down, then shared them with our media partners statewide.
Here’s some of what we found:
Nearly 87 percent of Colorado public school students …

By Burt Hubbard, I-News Network

More Colorado public school children are meeting state education standards for reading than they were 15 years ago, but fewer are excelling at the subject, an I-News Network analysis of new school testing scores shows.
State education officials today (Aug. 3) released scores for the standardized Colorado Student Assessment Program tests – known as CSAPs – which showed the portion of fourth graders in state public schools who meet or surpass state reading requirements has risen 10 percentage points since testing began a decade and a half …

Want to know the future of journalism? Meet the high school students who attended the I-News 2011 Investigative Journalism Institute.
They ranged in age from 16 to 18. They were of different backgrounds, means and experiences. But they were to the person sharp, thoughtful, and excited about journalism.
We put them to the test at the week-long institute, held on the University of Denver campus. The whole institute was designed as a working newsroom. These young journalists had to think like investigative reporters, figure out how to root out the deeper story, …

Play a game and help make journalism better!
I-News is part of the Public Insight Network, which encourages people to add their insights to in-depth reporting. You can learn more here.
And if that weren’t fun enough, PIN periodically offers news-related games. Here’s the latest. It’s called Budget Hero and it lets you try your own hand at balancing the federal budget.
U.S. Sen. Mark Udall of Colorado was one of a bipartisan group of lawmakers at the unveiling of the game in Washington, D.C.
“The point of the game is to …