Baltimore Brew “School & Story Map” : an interactive, education-centric portal to Baltimore

There are lots of ways to map a city – according to race, or real estate values or homicide rates. At Baltimore Brew, we’re going to try mapping the city – and our coverage – around Baltimore City Public Schools.

For people with kids – or anyone who measures the health and vibrancy of a community by how its public schools are doing – it will be a useful tool.

“The Map” (you can get a full-screen view of it here)  is, to be sure, a work-in-progress. We hope to have it de-bugged in time for THE start of school in September but, meanwhile, here ‘s a soft-launch version. We know it needs data-freshening, among other improvements, but before we get too far with that process, we would love to get some feedback from tech people, schools people, real estate people and any of our readers.

How it works:

Clicking on a school (from the map or from the school list) brings up, of course, basic info (website, phone number, address, etc.). But it also brings up some vital statistics  about each school (attendance rate, graduation rate) and Adequate Yearly Progress data, as well as the results of the BCPSS “School Climate Survey.”

In addition, it brings up Brew stories that have some connection to the neighborhood where that school is located. (Brew posts are being geo-tagged now.)

So, in other words, you could pull up a school and get posts about all sorts of nearby community happenings, resources and problems. These might be pieces on a nearby farmer’s market, a zoning controversy, a vigil to end violence or the participation of students from that school in a protest to stop planned development that would mean demolition of a civil rights site  in downtown Baltimore.

The Brew School and Story Map offers a both thematic and granular view of the city that is built around its schools. We hope it brings people together, rallies people to action,  and shows how education, so often ignored in Baltimore’s if-it-bleeds-it-leads news cycle, is really central to city life .

Created with generous support from the Robert W. Deutsch Foundation, as well as J-Lab and the Towson University Center for GIS