The mission of this award is to promote excellence and creativity in the reporting of statistics-based findings to the Canadian public in an era when more and more reportage is being based on statistical analyses and interpretations. Data journalism on any subject involving statistics based findings and analyses is eligible for the award. The award is to be presented at the annual meeting of the Canadian Science Writers' Association.

We actively seek submissions from individual Canadian print, online and broadcast journalists and bloggers as well as journalism media outlets. Entries can have been published, broadcast or mounted online in English or in French and must have appeared in 2015.

The following criteria will bear equal weight in the evaluation of the submissions:

(1) Ease of understanding what the data is saying and the visual elegance and originality in how that data is conveyed.

(2) Impact of the entry on improving the public’s understanding of the data and on its general contribution to increased statistical literacy amongst Canadians.

Note: An article exhibiting significant flaws in its statistical interpretation shall not be considered for this award.

Applicants must    be Canadian citizens or permanent residents, and  the submitted work must have appeared in Canadian-based media.  Applicants need not be members of the Canadian Science Writers' Association.

The Excellence in Data Journalism Award will normally be given out yearly. Award winners will   receive a total monetary prize of $1,000 and a certificate from the Statistical Society of Canada. The prize may not be awarded if none of the submissions are deemed to have achieved a high level of excellence.

The deadline for this award is March 15, 2016. Jurors for the award will include at least one statistician and one journalist.