A group of parents decided to respond the same day when the New York Times reported that billionaires and Trump donor, Betsy DeVos was slashing funds for poor rural schools. The parents created an interactive campaign using free apps and a little help from DemLabs.
How could the impact of these cuts be made personal? How could other parents see if their children would be hurt? What action could they take to protest? How are these school funding cuts related to the massive Republican tax give aways to wealthy donors?
They chose StoryMaps, a free storytelling app from esri to tell this story. It lets you combine text, images and maps into an interactive story that’s easy to share online.
StoryMap design
This story has to take complex data and explain how it would hrt struggling families. Readers can see if their child’s school will be hurt, what’s behing the funding cuts and how they can protest. A volunteer designed this StoryMap in four hours with these simple steps:
1. Details on schools were downloaded from the Department of Education website.
2. Information on the schools was overlaid with congressional districts using ArcGIS.
3. This map was incorporated into a StoryMap along with news headlines.
4. Graphics designed with Canva were added to the StoryMap.
5. A shortlink (bit.ly/betsycuts) was created for the StoryMap with bit.ly
Takeaway
Use StoryMaps to tell your story. Learn more about creating a StoryMap here.
Please share this StoryMap: bit.ly/betsycuts
Schools for poor, rural families shouldn’t have to be cut to pay for tax cuts for billionaires
Deepak
Co-Founder, DemLabs
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