Data analysis and visualization skills are a hot commodity across job roles and industries. One of the most intriguing applications—weather forecasting—is also essential to public safety.

Marshall Shepherd, an associate dean for the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, joined experts from The Weather Channel at the annual Developing Data Analytics Capabilities Conference to discuss how effective weather forecasting relies on data storytelling. The conference was hosted by the Georgia Data Innovation Hub at UGA, an initiative of the Carl Vinson Institute of Government that offers governments technical assistance and training in data analytics, data visualization and predictive analytics.

Shepherd set the stage with a weather data overview. He was joined by The Weather Channel’s Matt Sitkowski and Mike Chesterfield, who spoke about advanced data visualization technology used to translate data into forecasts.

The three explained how effective weather forecasting relies on data storytelling. Shepherd set the stage with a weather data overview, and Sitkowski and Chesterfield spoke about advanced data visualization technology used to translate data into forecasts.

In addition to associate dean, Shepherd serves as the UGA Department of Geography’s Atmospheric Sciences Program director, and host of the “Weather Geeks” podcast. He noted that while data is plentiful and easily accessible, it takes a skilled professional to analyze, interpret and package that data into meaningful and actionable insights.

“What you’re seeing is useful information presented in a way that you can use to make decisions, but it’s actually data converted to information from essentially a set of ones and zeros,” he said. “We’re in an era of rapid dissemination, availability, equalization and democratization of data, particularly in the weather space. It creates challenges for us in terms of communicating credible and authoritative data.”

Read more about the conference.