The IRE Resource Center is a major research library containing more than 23,250 investigative stories — both print and broadcast. Add to that more than 3,000 tipsheets from our national conferences on how to cover specific beats or do specific stories and you have a resource that no reporter or editor should be without. These stories and tipsheets are searchable online or by contacting the Resource Center directly (573-882-3364 or rescntr@ire.org) where a researcher can help you pinpoint what you need. Browse or search the tipsheet section of our library below. Logged-in members can view the tipsheets free online:
Search results for "inspection" ...
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Ivory tower inspections: Holding higher education's complex bureaucracies accountable
Gabrielson discusses the challenges of deciphering the world if higher education. He suggests ways of demystifying the institutions if you're covering higher education; who to know to get the information/data you need; reading internal control audits to better understand university finances; and map the university's income sources.
Tags: education; higher education; college; university; administration; students; academic fraud; audit; tuition
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CAR stories for every newsroom
Off suggests data and stories that can be used in every newsroom to cover stories on such topics as: school call to police; dam inspections; group homes; property records and many more.
Tags: CAR; computer-assisted reporting; quick hits;
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10 stories for most anywhere
Herzog provides a list of stories that can be done in almost any community and the data you can use to complete them: overtime for public workers; underground fuel tank issues; emergency service response time; parking tickets; problems with voter rolls; daycare inspections; stimulus spending on bridges; speeding tickets; minority home-loan gap; gas pump accuracy
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Quick Hit Science and Health Ideas
Fallik gives 10 quick hit ideas for science and health care stories. Each idea can yield a quick and impressive story, with the potential of a more involved, deeper story.
Tags: health; science; patents; medical boards; adverse event databases; inspections; 990s
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10 Story Ideas for Quick Turn Business Beat Investigations
Lorek gives a list of quick hit stories for the business beat with suggestions ranging from mining EPA violations to OSHA inspection reports,
Tags: EPA; military contracts; appraisal district; nonprofits; tax abatements; SEC filings; Attorneys General office; mortgage brokers; databases; complaints; OSHA;
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Paper and Databse Trails
Hall discusses the information that an investigative reporter can gather from various data sources including documents and databases. The tipsheet provides a list of documents/records and what sort of information you can anticipate finding with each given example
Tags: documents; FOI; databases; audits; payroll documents; police reports; correspondence; reports; annual budgets; overtime; purchasing records; contracts; campaign finance reports; test scores; tax-exempt organizations; inspection reports
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Quick Hit CAR
This PowerPoint details how to do quick stories utilizing computer-assisted reporting techniques. Included are story ideas for when disasters hit; enterprise reporting; inspections and enforcements; and more lighthearted fare (singles, pet licenses, etc.)
Tags: quick hit; Computer-assisted reporting; CAR; enterprise reporting; disasters; OSHA; sex offenders; elections; inspections; enforcements; infrastructure
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The year in CAR
The tipsheet features a PowerPoint slideshow of notable computer-assisted reporting investigations of 2008.
Tags: computer-assisted reporting; housing; data; trade; education; lobbying; fire; day care; parking; vote; earmarks; inspection; sewage; EveryBlock; airbags; mammogram; arrest; railroad; pothole; sprawl; pesticide; crime; drugs; transplant; scholarship; mental health
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From Database to Story - A Step-by-step Guide
Harbord and McKie show how you can utilize OSHA data to tell the story of workplace safety in non-traditional industries such as healthcare, schools (e.g., violence) and business (carpal tunnel syndrome). Their tipsheet walks you through the process of analyzing the data. And how to compare this information to other data sets to obtain a more complete sense of "the story."
Tags: data; database; OSHA; query; NAICS; excel; pivot tables; inspections; NICAR; National Institute of Computer-Assisted Reporting
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Assisted Living Tipsheet
The author discusses how to investigate long term care for the elderly. He explains the difference between nursing homes and assisted living facilities. The tipsheet also suggests documents and sources that will be useful for investigating either type of facility.
Tags: elder care; nusing homes; assisted living; Medicare; Medicaid; 911 calls; inspection reports