TASK: Create infographics about specific topics relating to the Pennsylvania Carceral System using research, data visualization, and thoughtful design.
As the culminating assignment for Christina Cook’s English 015 course, her students used the rhetorical skills they had built throughout the semester to create infographics on various carcerality issues in Pennsylvania, such as wrongfully incarcerated persons in PA, re-entry coalitions in PA, the proximity of Penn State campuses to carceral facilities, and privately owned for-profit carceral facilities across the state.
Potential Impact for this Commissioned Assignment
For several semesters, Christina Cook’s English 015 course has collaborated with Penn State University’s Restorative Justice Initiative (RJI), “a university-wide coalition of faculty members, graduate students, staff, and community groups dedicated to restoring and empowering individuals that are incarcerated through education and meaningful engagement in civic life.” Cook aims to use the class to help further RJI’s mission.
In past semesters, Cook’s students have taken on other projects, like creating a trifold brochure about the college application process, specifically designed for individuals transitioning out of incarceration. In Spring 2021 and this current semester, her students have been tasked with the infographic assignment. These infographics can be used by RJI in their educational materials, communications, and online presence.
Making the Infographics
To prepare students for the topics covered in the final project, many of the earlier units in this English 015 course incorporated content related to RJI and its mission. For instance, the Rhetorical Analysis unit asks students to analyze Ava Duverney’s documentary 13th about mass incarceration in the United States. Before introducing the infographic assignment, Cook invited Divine Lipscomb, the Special Projects Coordinator at RJI, into the classroom to present and lead a discussion with her students.
After choosing their topics from a pre-selected list, students began conducting research, getting started with the project-specific library resource guide created by Penn State research librarian Ellysa Cahoy. As part of their infographic, students created some kind of data visualization—a pie chart, a word cloud, a timeline, etc.—with the information they discovered. In the example shown here, a student created a visual representation of the racial demographics of exonerated people in Philadelphia.
When students were ready to start designing their infographics, they were asked to create a “wireframe,” or “a visual map that uses basic shapes and textboxes to sketch out the organizational logic of your design.” The wireframe scaffold helps students create graphics that are functional and compelling for their intended audiences.
Finally, students could begin putting together their infographics. The infographics should “be organized around a focused message that tells a story and suggests specific conclusions” and should also “rely primarily on visual evidence… using minimal text to support and reinforce ideas.”
Click to access Tillman-Infographic.pdf
This example demonstrates these qualities: the message of the infographic is clear without being text heavy.
As part of the drafting process, Cook also collaborated with the Writing Center at Penn State Learning to help her students revise their infographics. Two writing tutors joined the class for their workshop day and Cook asked students to make appointments at the writing center to review their rough drafts. Lastly, to supplement the infographic assignment, students also wrote a two-page rhetorical analysis of their infographics. This short essay asked students to consider the audience and purpose of their infographics and to analyze how their content and design choices helped achieve that purpose.
Overall, this collaboration has been very successful, and Cook hopes to continue this project “indefinitely”! The infographics directly help further RJI’s mission, specifically their goal of creating awareness of issues impacting incarcerated communities. Additionally, the project has led many students to seek out more information and become involved with RJI—one student even went on to become the president of sRJI (Penn State’s Student Restorative Justice Initiative). Other students expressed that they found meaning in the project because it could potentially impact someone’s life.