Submitted by clark on
Thanks to additional support from the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction (DPI), the WPLC Data Dashboard access has been extended until June 30, 2025. If you are new the statewide public library data dashboard, the below email announcement shared in September 2024 gives a great overview and links to additional training materials.
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In partnership with the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction (DPI), the Wisconsin Public Library Consortium (WPLC) is facilitating a statewide data dashboard pilot from September 3-December 31, 2024. During the dashboard pilot, all public library and system staff from across the state will have barrier-free access to a statewide dashboard composed primarily of public library service data as gathered in Wisconsin’s Annual Report.
All library staff are encouraged to utilize this free tool! The dashboard includes over 35 data points from the Annual Report, as well as some customized calculations. All public library service data (as reported to DPI) from 2015-2023 will be available in a visualized format that allows for peer library comparisons. In addition, the dashboard offers cohort options based on library locale and resident population size for optional benchmarking options when examining library data.
You can access the dashboard on the WPLC website at: https://wplc.info/dashboard. (Please note this webpage is unlisted on the WPLC website so you will not be able to navigate to it from the main page.) No login credentials are needed!
As part of the pilot, feedback is being solicited from users about the benefits and challenges of dashboard use and the ways in which library staff utilize tools such as this one. To that end, users are being provided with training materials on how to use the dashboard and different ways to consider/engage with the included data. Your experiences will be an essential component of improving public library data access and use as part of this pilot! We hope you will participate.
For any questions about the dashboard pilot, please reach out to Kim at WiLS - her email address is kim@wils.org.