Literature v3 · Research topic
Does wildfire smoke hit low-income California counties harder?
Using free public data, you can investigate whether poorer counties face worse air pollution from wildfires.
Why this matters
Wildfires in California are becoming more frequent and intense, but who bears the brunt of the smoke? Using free public data, we can investigate whether low-income communities and communities of color are disproportionately exposed to harmful PM2.5 from wildfires.
Project scores
Difficulty
This project involves analyzing publicly available environmental and demographic data to explore correlations. Over 8 weeks, you will learn to clean and merge datasets, perform statistical analysis, and interpret results. Prerequisites include basic statistics and spreadsheet skills; familiarity with R or Python is helpful but not required. The pace is moderate, with data collection and cleaning t
3 of 5 difficulty
Strengths
- Uses real-world, publicly available data
- Addresses a timely environmental justice issue
- Develops data analysis and critical thinking skills
Skills built
Zero-cost data
Zero-cost dataResearch gap
Wildfires in California are becoming more frequent and intense, but who bears the brunt of the smoke? Using free public data, we can investigate whether low-income communities and communities of color are disproportionately exposed to harmful PM2.5 from wildfires.
Curriculum alignment
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