Enter the 2027 Data Viz Championship
Universitywide
Each year as part of Love Data Week in February, the Big Ten Academic Alliance (BTAA) holds a Data Viz Championship in which students, faculty, and staff showcase their data visualization skills and compete for a title and prizes. Each Big Ten institution can submit only one entry for students and one for faculty and staff. This means that to compete for the coveted title of Big Ten Academic Alliance Data Viz Champion, contestants first need to compete and win at the institutional level.
For the second year in a row, the Rutgers-wide Data Viz Championship—co-presented by Rutgers University Libraries and the Office of Information Technology—will name two winners, one student and one faculty/staff member, who will then go on to represent the university at the conference-wide BTAA Data Viz Championship.
Competition Information
Submissions for the Rutgers Data Viz Championship are split into two groups, students and faculty/staff. Please review the competition information below and then follow the submission instructions for your group.
- Entries to the championship will be evaluated by a panel of Rutgers faculty and staff judges using the BTAA scoring rubric.
- There will be a student first-place winner, two runners up, and a faculty/staff winner. The first-place student winner of the Rutgers Data Viz Championship will receive a $100 Amazon gift card; student runners up and the faculty/staff winner will receive swag. All awards are provided by Rutgers University Libraries.
- The student and faculty/staff winning entries will then advance to represent Rutgers at the Big Ten Academic Alliance Data Viz Championship where they will compete with entries from the other BTAA schools in a blinded competition.
- A panel of faculty/staff judges from multiple institutions will select the best student and faculty/staff submissions using the scoring rubric; these winners will receive the official, conference-wide Big Ten Academic Alliance Data Viz Champion title.
- Two additional awards, selected by popular vote, will be given to the best student and faculty/staff submissions.
Rutgers won the Judges’ Award for student submissions in 2026 with an entry by Sakshi Sowmya-Aravind that visualized measurements of how easy it is for a fan to jump into a university’s fight song by plotting each school across four distinct “spirit zones.” Explore all 2026 BTAA Data Viz submissions through the links below.
2026 Faculty and Staff Submissions
Student Instructions
Full submission requirements are as follows:
- Students must use the provided sample dataset on NCAA Women’s basketball, which can be downloaded below.
- Any data visualization tool is permitted as long as the result is accessible via a public link (no login required).
- The use of AI is not prohibited. Those submitting a visualization that has utilized AI must specify how it was used to support their project.
- Collaboration is encouraged; all collaborators must be credited.
- If selected for the conference-wide BTAA championship, one collaborator must be designated as the presenter.
NCAA Women’s Basketball Data Set
Submission form and deadline information coming soon.
Faculty and Staff Instructions
Full submission requirements are as follows:
- The visualization should be used for something related to the Big Ten (e.g., athletics, enrollment data), public research the creator is involved in, or information about the institution—whether the institution as a whole or a specific initiative/population.
- All submissions must follow the school’s institutional data policies and guidelines (i.e., please do not submit a viz with Social Security numbers, HIPAA information, or other personal/sensitive information).
- Any data visualization tool is permitted as long as the result is accessible via a public link (no login required).
- The use of AI is not prohibited. Those submitting a visualization that has utilized AI must specify how it was used to support their project.
- Faculty and staff should credit all involved as authors of the work.
- If selected for the conference-wide BTAA championship, one collaborator must be designated as the presenter.
Submission form and deadline information coming soon.
Contact Information
Any questions regarding the Data Viz competition should be directed to Laura Palumbo at laura.palumbo@rutgers.edu.
Love Data Week Info
Love Data Week (February 8–12, 2027) is an international celebration held every year during the week of Valentine’s Day. This collaborative, weeklong event brings together BTAA member universities to explore, share, and celebrate all things data. Both BTAA-wide programming and Rutgers University Libraries events will be offered throughout Love Data Week.
Keep an eye on the Rutgers University Libraries calendar of events and social media pages for announcements about Love Data Week programming and learn more about the Big Ten Academic Alliance’s Love Data Week below: