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Data visualization help

Consultations on turning data into clear charts and figures — for papers, posters, theses, and presentations.

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What a consult does

You leave knowing which chart type actually fits your comparison, how to make it readable in grayscale and for color-blind viewers, and how to export it at the resolution a journal or a poster printer needs. Staff won't build the figure for you, but they'll show you how in your tool of choice.

Common fixes

Dropping the third dimension off a bar chart, replacing a pie with a sorted bar, putting error bars on means, cutting chartjunk, and labeling directly instead of relying on a legend. Small changes that decide whether a reviewer trusts your result.

In and around Porter Falls

Research at Porter is applied and partner-driven: a Valley Health quality project, a DNR study on the Porter River, a manufacturing-process fix for a county employer. The Office of Research & Sponsored Programs handles the review and paperwork so the work can start on time.

The practical details

Book: A 45-minute consult with library data-services staff; bring your data and a draft figure if you have one. Covers: Choosing the right chart, fixing a misleading one, color and accessibility, tools (spreadsheet, R, Python, Tableau). Also: Publication-ready figure formatting and journal-specific requirements. Anything time-sensitive — an accommodation, a booking, a deadline — is worth confirming directly before you rely on it, because the specifics here can change from term to term.

If you have a question

The office behind this is Office of Research & Sponsored Programs (Millwright Hall, Room 340). Call (715) 555–0230 or email research@uwporterfalls.edu during the fall and spring terms, or sign in to MyPorter to send a message or book a time. If it turns out another office owns the question, they will route it rather than send you back to the start.

Fictional information

UW–Porter Falls is a work of parody. Every office, person, building, phone number and statistic on this page is invented; nothing here describes a real institution or a service you can actually contact.