While such revelations spur public discussion of the climate crisis, significant gaps remain in our understanding of the potential impact of climate change on human health — and in our ability to provide concrete evidence of this impact. To drive sustained action by policy- and decision-makers, journalists, and citizens, we need to make a clear and evidence-based causal connection between climate change and human health. Being able to prove this connection requires active and intentional interplay among data, tools, talent, and policy.

The Interplay of Data, Tools, Talent and Policy

Accurate, diverse, and comprehensive data assets including climate, health, infrastructure, socioeconomic, and other data sources captured over extended periods are the bedrock upon which credible attributions of climate change impact rest. Coupled with tools that are fit for purpose and co-developed with relevant stakeholders, these datasets can provide us with profound and useful insights. However, data and tools on their own have little value;  they depend on scientific expertise, interdisciplinary collaboration, and innovative thinking to parse the intricacies of the field and transform raw information into actionable knowledge. Additionally, policy plays a pivotal role in this endeavor by enabling evidence-based decision-making and fostering cooperation among different sectors. However, four key challenges currently impede progress in the field and warrant careful consideration. Below, we lay out these challenges and suggest ways to tackle them.

1. Move Beyond Siloed Approaches

First, deciphering the complex attribution puzzle requires the concerted efforts of climate scientists, health researchers, data modelers, analysts, policymakers, and many other experts. However, a persistent challenge hampers our progress; the prevalence of siloed working environments. Siloed approaches can result in wasted resources, time, and effort, and may lead to biased, inconsistent, or conflicting findings. A 2022 Lancet Planetary Health paper reports that fewer than half of the studies on climate change’s impact on mental health were designed or conducted in collaboration with mental health researchers or published in mental health journals, implying gaps in interdisciplinary collaborations. This compartmentalized approach compromises our ability to address the multifaceted challenges posed by climate change.

2. Build a New Breed of Data Science Practitioners

Today, there is limited global technical capacity to conduct detection and attribution studies on climate and health. This limitation curtails our ability to generate robust evidence on the impact of climate change on health on a global scale. Addressing this challenge is crucial and demands a concerted effort to bolster capacity. We need a new breed of data science practitioners at the intersection of climate and health to unlock this potential through a thorough understanding of these and other issues in the climate and health field. This interdisciplinary approach is one of the core tenets of the Capacity Accelerator Network, where, with the support of Wellcome, data.org is building local data science talent across Africa and India. These cohorts of interdisciplinary data science practitioners are being trained to analyze complex data from multiple sources (e.g., climate, environmental, health, demographic, etc.) to generate a robust evidence base to support policy and decision-making processes in government, social impact organizations, and community-based organizations.

India’s National Programme on Climate Change and Human Health (NPCCHH) provides a clear and replicable example of how policymakers could boost the creation of this new kind of practitioner to support national and international efforts to make the connection between climate and health. Launched in 2019 by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare’s National Health Mission, this initiative derives insights from complex, seemingly disparate datasets. Such initiatives mobilize action by providing directionality for matters of global emergency. Since then, the Ministry has called for state-specific action plans to which several states have responded with strategies and operational frameworks to engage climate and health experts and analyze data from both sectors to drive action. More recently, the Indian government is in the process of hiring data analysts and data scientists to enable various ministries to unlock value from their own datasets and make them accessible to others to generate novel insights.

3. Leverage Strategic Communication and Data Storytelling

Communicating insights in an easy-to-understand and actionable manner can ensure swift action by relevant stakeholders. This requires results from research to be available in accessible formats to laypersons, journalists, government leaders, and other relevant stakeholders. Examples of accessible research might include charts and visualizations, policy briefs, media articles, and short videos. These kinds of communications assets can clarify complex concepts enabling stakeholders to take action, and can also broaden and improve the public conversation about issues that affect everyone, like the impact of climate change on human health.

4. Activate Evidence-driven Policymaking

Finally, climate policies should consider both the scientific evidence and the real-world constraints of policy implementation. A policy-enabling environment demands a strong evidence base. This evidence-driven approach lends weight to policy discussions and might have far-reaching implications. For example, it can significantly bolster cases related to loss and damage, as countries affected by climate-induced health impact can substantiate their claims with clear attribution studies. Moreover, robust evidence on the health repercussions of climate change strengthens the foundation for countries to secure funds for adaptation and mitigation efforts. Such evidence provides a compelling narrative, demonstrating the urgency of action and the real-world consequences that demand financial support. Ultimately, this evidence-driven approach advances the cause of safeguarding public health in the face of a changing climate while also promoting equitable access to resources for adaptation.

As we gear up for COP28 later this year, a historic event that will dedicate a full day to the critical topic of health for the first time, we have an opportunity to underscore the impact climate change has on health. Amid the discourse on the global stage, we must address the current challenges to attribute climate change’s impact on health with a sense of urgency. By addressing these challenges across data, tools, talent, and policy in a collaborative and transdisciplinary manner we will fortify our evidence base, setting the stage for a clear and compelling mandate to demand resolute action from world leaders.

This post has been written with research support by Young India Fellows, Aadya Vatsa, Manan Batra, and Tanmay Sarkar from Ashoka University.

The post The Attribution Challenge Between Climate Change and Health appeared first on data.org.

Being physically present helped us hear firsthand about the specific challenges, cultural nuances, and social dynamics at play locally. Not to mention the opportunity to share meals, hear insights, and engage in casual conversation — all critical as we build trust and collaboration toward a common purpose. 

The reason for our trip was to launch the India Data Capacity Accelerator, part of data.org’s Capacity Accelerator program supported by Wellcome. The program aims to create curriculum, resources, and interdisciplinary and experiential learning programs to train data practitioners at the intersection of climate and health. 

We can’t act fast enough on climate. 

The World Health Organization estimates that climate change is expected to cause 250,000 additional deaths per year between 2030 and 2050. And we learned that doing this work in India — where there is a broad understanding of the urgency and a cross-sectoral commitment to action — poses a tremendous opportunity for developing effective solutions.

Climate justice, gender justice, social justice, and social protection are all interrelated. We need to really recognize that this whole question of justice and how data can unblock the system and understand real needs becomes very important.

Professor N. Vinod Chandra Menon, International Coordinator, G20 C20 Working Group on Resilient Communities: Climate, Environment, and Net Zero Targets

Under the auspices of the G20-C20 and hosted by the University of Chicago Center in Delhi with our partner J-PAL South Asia, the convening brought together nearly 100 passionate leaders to discuss how we can together build a workforce using data to combat climate change and its impact on human health. 

With the announcement of our new partnership with three prestigious universities (Ashoka University, Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani (BITS Pilani), and Indraprastha Institute of Information Technology (IIIT Delhi) we underscored data.org’s belief in and commitment to working with in-country expertise — expertise that can that inform efforts globally.   

In addition to being reminded of the importance of in-person connection, three insights emerged:

1. Data can make sense of multiple, inextricable challenges 

Our event speaker, Vinod Menon, observed that climate justice, gender justice, social justice, and social protection are all interrelated — a critical piece that is often missed when developing strategies for social impact. Gone are the days when we could view climate change as a discrete problem to be solved. The impact of the climate crisis on human health is now undeniable. Climate change also has far-reaching consequences for social justice and gender equality. Our time in India shed even more light on the urgent need to harness the power of data to understand these complex interactions and develop effective, intersectional solutions.

2. Smart solutions have the potential to cross continents

The energy and focus on technology we saw in India mirrored our visit to Nigeria earlier this year. Both countries have young median ages and high levels of investment in technology and both are also developing data-driven solutions and training on-the-ground interdisciplinary teams focused on local impact. This is exactly the type of ecosystem work we are investing in at data.org. Recently, Inclusive Growth & Recovery Challenge awardee BASE adapted their cold chain storage solutions from India to Africa. We see that it is possible to have technology and capacity-building advances to cross continents.  

3. Don’t underestimate the power of partnering with the government to drive change

It was inspiring to hear the Indian government’s Capacity Building Commission (CBC) share its vision for upskilling government employees in various data-related fields. They shared their comprehensive plans to equip over a million government employees with the necessary skills and knowledge to work with data — effectively and responsibly. This initiative has the potential to create a profound ripple effect of data literacy and expertise across sectors. It also recognizes that data-driven governance can lead to more efficient and effective public services, informed policy decisions, and ultimately, improved outcomes for citizens.

Sure zoom makes work efficient — but without a doubt our in-person time in India (and Nigeria) was our most important takeaway. There is no substitute for collaborating and problem-solving together. 

Our conversations in India reminded us of the power of data and technology — including new, transformative technologies like generative AI — to tackle social sector challenges like the impact of climate on human health. Being together also allowed us the time and space to ask hard questions, and to share insights on the responsible use of data and technology — a topic that is in the news daily. 

We are so excited to scale our impact and build our partnerships through the India Data Capacity Accelerator, and can’t wait to share our next update. 

The post Insights from India: Face-to-face Connection and Climate Action appeared first on data.org.

Since the debut of Ms. Turner’s hit song, a variation of this simple question has been asked the world over as a way to explore the relevance of one subject to another. Such questions have long been asked in the field of data science, where (as just one example) generative AI and the data it’s being trained on are frequently being exposed for harboring misogynist biasees.  

Nevertheless, when inherent and oftentimes obvious gender biases are pointed out, people working in data are still asking: What’s gender got to do with it?  

It’s no secret that when working in social impact, achieving meaningful and sustained change requires a deep understanding of the populations with whom we collaborate. This of course includes gender dynamics. Data upskilling that includes gender as its own distinct knowledge area empowers individuals in the social impact sector to harness data in ways that can promote more equitable outcomes for women, girls, men, boys, and girls alike.  

Earlier this year data.org, in partnership with TechChange, sponsored the Gender Data 101 course for nearly 1,250 people. Our priority for this course was to incorporate gender into the data skills training to enable the immediate practical application.  

If this was not achieved, there was a risk our target audience would struggle to derive value from the learning experience. Drawing on feedback from the course offered between February and May 2023, as well as best practices in gender and development, here are three takeaways where gender data upskilling contributes to more equitable futures and benefits from an intersectional understanding and application of gender considerations throughout the data value chain. 

1. Unlocking the Transformative Potential of Data for Social Impact 

 
Data is increasingly informing decision-making, resource allocation, and more, gender data upskilling can equip stakeholders with the know-how to collect, analyze, and interpret gender-disaggregated data. But this work is more than just statistical analysis. It helps data and social impact practitioners understand qualitative data, including the root causes of gender inequality, and to uncover hidden patterns, and expose systemic biases that can negatively affect development outcomes. In turn, insights can be generated that highlight any unique challenges faced by different genders in different areas of global development. Harnessing this knowledge will lead to evidence-based solutions that are gender transformative. By transforming raw numbers into actionable insights, gender data upskilling enables practitioners to foment more equitable social change with increased precision.  

Florencia Cicchini, a Gender Data 101 participant based in Mexico said “…the most valuable takeaway [from the course] is the ability to identify entry points for gender mainstreaming in all the stages of the data lifecycle.”  

2. Creating Space for an Array of Data Practitioners 

In our Workforce Wanted: Data Talent for Social Impact report, we added evidence showing that people with disabilities, people who identify as women, and people who work in low- and middle-income contexts are among the least represented in data roles.  

Gender Data 101 course prioritized enrolling individuals whose own lived experiences may have in the past put a data upskilling course participation out of reach. By assembling a cohort of people with a shared understanding of marginalized communities, opportunities were created to promote knowledge exchange among groups whose data sovereignty has frequently been compromised or denied altogether. The intentional design of this community of practice resulted in conversations that linked data and gender to ability, language, geography, and sexuality. Such a melange created a learning space where intersectional thinking for gender data upskilling was baked in from the start, providing a lens through which course content could be more deeply understood by participants and even to lead to new innovations.  

Lika Døhl Diouf, a course participant based in Trinidad and Tobago shared of one of her key takeaways: “[The] second thing was learning how to do an intersectional analysis. There was a video in there from We All Count showing an intersectional pay gap analysis, and I am already thinking about how I can use that type of analysis to illustrate the digital divide here in the Caribbean.” 

3. Designing Projects and Programs that are Gender Transformative 

Gender data upskilling not only opens the doors to a vibrant and supportive community of change agents; people with gender data know-how are in a prime position to instigate gender transformation through their project and program design, participation, and leadership. As mentioned earlier, it was important for the Gender Data 101 course outcomes to include the ability for participants to apply the gender data skills acquired. To earn our Gender 101 certificate of course completion, participants submitted a final project that demonstrated what they learned. Many such projects produced incredible outputs that operationalize their recently acquired or enhanced gender data skills in unique ways for equitable future outcomes, including: 

• Gender analysis of a conditional cash transfer program in Paraguay 
• Data visualization of women and men’s access to finance in Jordan 
• Uptake and impact plan for the provision of gender-based violence support services in Malaysia 
• Assessment of reproductive health, family planning, and child immunization services in India 
• Gender data workshop in Cameroon 
• Survey adaptation to ask questions about the specific experiences of female data scientists in Colombia 
• Monitoring, evaluation, and learning toolkit for global projects that collaborate with girl children 

These projects energize me and get us closer to finally answering: What’s gender got to do with it?  

In the months ahead, we look forward to exploring other ways in which data upskilling contributes to equitable futures by offering more courses like Gender Data 101. We hope you’ll join us on our mission to do data differently through training and digital learning, and in the meantime, you can stay connected with us to learn about our new courses as they launch! 

The post Data Upskilling for Equitable Futures: What’s Gender Got to Do With It? appeared first on data.org.

The India Data Capacity Accelerator is the third workforce partnership in data.org’s Capacity Accelerator Network (CAN). To date, data.org programs have engaged 16 academic partners around the world to help build data capacity and tools within the social impact sector. 

Selected by an open request-for-proposals process, Ashoka University, Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani (BITS Pilani), and Indraprastha Institute of Information Technology (IIIT) Delhi will support the design and rollout of curriculum, resources, and interdisciplinary and experiential learning programs to create and engage top data talent — a consistent challenge for the social impact sector.  

“A million brains are better than one, and the fact is, we need to accelerate training more data practitioners in the social sector to take advantage of the data revolution,” said Danil Mikhailov, executive director of data.org. “Our recent Workforce Wanted report identified an opportunity for 3.5 million jobs in the data for social impact field in developing countries alone over the next decade. The India Accelerator gets us one step closer to our commitment to training one million, purpose-driven data practitioners by 2032. We are thankful for the support from Wellcome and our partnership with J-PAL, and we look forward to collaborating with these three prestigious universities, who, together, will offer a comprehensive platform that combines academic excellence with practical application and classroom learning.”

The World Health Organization estimates that between 2030 and 2050, climate change is expected to cause approximately 250,000 additional deaths per year. This new capacity accelerator will train data practitioners on the front lines of the climate crisis to help advance solutions to climate-related health issues. 

“Practical, effective, and scalable solutions to the climate crisis in India and the world will remain elusive unless innovations have been rigorously tested for effectiveness,” said Tithee Mukhopadhyay, Deputy Executive Director, J-PAL South Asia. “The India Data Capacity Accelerator is the latest step in J-PAL South Asia’s continued efforts to unlock and leverage data and scientific evidence for making effective policies in collaboration with our university, social impact, and policy partners. The program’s innovative model of combining theoretical lessons and practical training on harnessing, analyzing, and applying data will prepare young professionals to become leaders in the social impact sector.”

The three universities chosen for this important work demonstrated not only experience and capabilities in data, climate, and health — but in social impact; intersectionality; and inclusion, diversity, equity, and accessibility (IDEA). 

“Given the diversity of a country as large as India and the varied needs of a broad set of learners, we knew we needed a mix of public and private universities covering a wide geographic footprint and offering online, in-person, and hybrid learning opportunities,” said Priyank Hirani, associate director of CAN. “We are so pleased with our first set of academic partners in this network in India who each bring complementary expertise and cater to a specific segment of aspiring data talent.”

• Ashoka University is India’s first liberal arts and sciences private university and a prominent player in the Indian social sector through its esteemed research centers. As part of the accelerator, it will offer an online postgraduate certificate targeted to young professionals in climate and health organizations.
  
  “We are excited to launch the executive development program for social sector practitioners with data.org’s support as part of their India Data Capacity Accelerator,” said Pramath Raj Sinha, Chairperson of the Board of Trustees of Ashoka University. “Much like data.org, Ashoka emphasizes nurturing leaders committed to addressing systemic social challenges, interdisciplinary approaches to solving global problems in its curricula, and inclusion and diversity in its student body.”

• One of the first six schools to be awarded the “Institute of Eminence” status in 2018 by the Government of India, Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani (BITS Pilani) has four campuses across the country and will offer both an undergraduate minor to students in its Pilani, Goa, and Hyderabad campuses and a postgraduate degree through its work integrated learning platform for professionals who already have technology and data proficiency.
  
  “India generates a lot of data that can be of immense use when addressing climate change or finding better healthcare solutions for the world’s population,” said Professor V. Ramgopal Rao, Vice Chancellor of BITS Pilani. He added, “BITS Pilani is committed to providing solutions to effectively utilize this data by increasing the trained manpower in data for social good through interdisciplinary programs for both first-degree level and working professionals.”

• Created by an act of the Delhi legislature as a comprehensive research-led teaching institute, Indraprastha Institute of Information Technology Delhi (IIIT-Delhi) will provide both technical and non-technical professionals with the hybrid program Post-Graduate Diploma in Data Science in Health and Climate Change for Social Impact.

“Data for social impact is a growing field in India, but until now, there have been limited academic courses, training, or leadership development programs available,” said Ranjan Bose, Director of IIIT-Delhi. “Building on our experience of running existing programs in computing, data science, and AI, we are excited to bring our expertise to this partnership as we work toward increasing capacity in India, and, ultimately, helping improve lives.”

The launch of this new accelerator was celebrated at a day-long convening of leaders across sectors hosted by data.org and the Working Group on Sustainable and Resilient Communities: Climate, Environment, and Net Zero Targets under Civil Society 20 during India’s G20 Presidency 2023. The convening took place at the University of Chicago Center in Delhi, where participants presented expert perspectives and discussed shared goals for impact through the creation of data capacity for climate and health. 

About data.org: 

data.org is accelerating the power of data to solve some of our greatest global challenges. Launched in 2020 by the Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth and The Rockefeller Foundation, data.org serves as a platform for partnerships to build the field of data for social impact by widening access to the tools, resources, and talent needed to make sustainable and equitable change.    

A global organization, data.org convenes and coordinates across sectors and is committed to supporting and amplifying visionary — but also practical — solutions to drive greater impact, through data.

About Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL) South Asia: 

The Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL) is a global research center working to reduce poverty by ensuring that policy is informed by scientific evidence. Anchored by a network of 294 affiliated professors at universities around the world, J-PAL conducts randomized impact evaluations to answer critical questions in the fight against poverty.

J-PAL was launched at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2003 and has 7 regional offices around the world. J-PAL South Asia, hosted by the Institute for Financial Management and Research (IFMR), Chennai, has built partnerships for the generation of new research and advancement of evidence-informed policymaking with 20 Indian state and central government ministries, as well as training partnerships with the governments of Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh, and Pakistan.

 For more information, visit povertyactionlab.org/south-asia. 

About Ashoka University

Ashoka University is India’s premier interdisciplinary research and teaching institution, providing higher education at par with the best in the world. A unique example of collective philanthropy, it is funded by close to 200 leaders, thinkers, academics and philanthropists from a range of fields. Its faculty body consists of eminent individuals who have studied and taught at the world’s finest institutions. Ashoka offers a diverse and inclusive space for its students to think deeply and critically. It envisions developing global leaders who understand disciplinary boundaries, express themselves creatively, and communicate with meaning to cause impact and change. With over 2600 students and 14 dedicated research centres today, the university offers programmes and research opportunities in the humanities, natural sciences and social sciences. In its next phase of growth, the university is building a second campus and making major investments in the Sciences, including original cutting-edge research in vital areas like biosciences and information technology. Ashoka’s 4000 alumni are making a significant impact in hundreds of leading organizations and dozens of leading universities across the globe. Ashoka is a non-profit university established under the Haryana Private Universities Act, 2006. It is located in Rajiv Gandhi Education City, Sonipat, Delhi NCR, India.

About Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani (BITS Pilani)

The Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani (BITS Pilani), is a deemed university recognized as an “Institution of Eminence” by the Ministry of Education, Government of India. BITS Pilani is a pioneer in Higher education in all the major disciplines of Engineering and Sciences, with Humanities, Social Sciences, Economics and Finance in its ambit. Its four modern, aesthetically beautiful and fully residential campuses at Pilani, Dubai, Goa and Hyderabad with state-of-the-art facilities for teaching and research provide a unique ambience for student and faculty interaction. BITS Pilani is establishing yet another campus in Mumbai to house the School of Management and School of Law. The primary aim of BITS Pilani is to advance knowledge and educate students in science, technology, and other areas of scholarship that will best serve the nation and the world in the 21st century. The Institute was established in 1964 by the late Shri G. D. Birla, an eminent industrialist, a participant in the Indian freedom struggle and a close associate of Mahatma Gandhi. Over the years, BITS Pilani has provided the highest quality technical education to students from all over India, admitted on the basis of merit. Its graduates can be found worldwide in eminent leadership positions in all areas of engineering, science and commerce. BITS Pilani is proud to have given 13 unicorns to the country and more than 7500 founders and co-founders. The Institute’s commitment to excellence, adherence to merit, transparency, innovation, and enterprise have characterized its steady march to eminence.

About Indraprastha Institute of Information Technology Delhi (IIIT-Delhi)

IIIT-Delhi is a comprehensive research-led teaching Institute where faculty, students, and alumni work together in a spirit of discovery and creativity to build a better world. The Institute, set up by an Act of Govt. of NCT of Delhi (GNCTD), awards B.Tech., M.Tech., and Doctoral degrees. It emphasizes quality education, curiosity-led research, and innovation leading to entrepreneurship. The teaching activities at the Institute derive strength from the cutting-edge research conducted by faculty, strong industry linkages, and international collaborations.

IIIT-Delhi has six academic departments – Computer Science and Engineering, Electronics and Communications Engineering, Computational Biology, Human-Centered Design, Mathematics, and Social Sciences & Humanities. Its research centers include the Infosys Centre for Artificial Intelligence, Centre for Design and New Media, Centre of Technology in Policing, Centre of Excellence on Sustainable Mobility, Centre of Excellence in Healthcare, Centre of Excellence on Light Fidelity, Datakart Centre of Excellence, Centre of Excellence (CoE) in Human-Centered Computing, and ​​​Center for Quantum Technologies.

The IIITD-Incubation Centre on campus is instrumental in driving the growth of entrepreneurial activities. IIIT-Delhi has also set up a Technology Innovation Hub called iHub Anubhuti under the National Mission on Interdisciplinary Cyber-Physical Systems. There is also an Electropreneur Park focused on electronics startups.

More details can be found at iiitd.ac.in.

Media Contact 

data.org: Emma Marty | emma@data.org

The post data.org Unveils Newest Workforce Training Network in India to Tackle Climate and Health appeared first on data.org.

Despite rapid growth in the field of data for social impact (DSI), only limited academic courses, training, and leadership programs are available worldwide. Add to this a persistent workforce shortage, with equally persistent barriers that exclude women, minorities, and other marginalized groups, and significant gaps emerge in the DSI talent pipeline. 

To address these gaps, CAN is creating a global ecosystem of academic and training partners to help build a diverse DSI workforce. And to deliver on our commitment to diversity, we must engage a similarly diverse network of partners — partners that span geographies, pedagogies, learning modalities, and more. 

Finding the Fit

When data.org received $6.8M USD from Wellcome in the fall of 2022 to drive capacity development for climate and health, including the launch of a new Data Capacity Accelerator in India, we knew the immensity of the opportunity and the challenge. 

The Accelerator is designed to train data practitioners on the front lines of the climate crisis to advance solutions to climate-related human health issues — an urgent challenge that also requires an urgent timeline. We needed to identify experienced academic partners that could stand up and launch fully-fledged training programs by August 2023.

With more than 1,000 universities in India, identifying institutions with subject-matter expertise in data capacity to address both health and climate proved daunting. Plus, the varied needs of a broad set of learners meant finding a mix of public and private universities covering a wide geographic footprint and offering online, in-person, and hybrid learning opportunities.

Our secondary research surfaced about 50 data science programs run by various schools, with most focusing on preparing learners for the private sector. The lack of interdisciplinarity and experiential learning exposure in how data science is taught in most academic settings today was striking. Critical to our vision of a DSI program focusing on climate and health, were interdisciplinarity, IDEA, and exemplifying pathways in DSI careers. It was important to engage several departments within a university that often deliver programs in silos and nudge them to reimagine data science curriculum, pedagogy, and learning outcomes.

As we continued our research, we also grappled with questions around our own unconscious biases and the threat of overlooking lesser-known but equally qualified institutions. Most importantly, we wanted to ensure the process followed our commitment to intersectionality and to inclusion, diversity, equity, and accessibility (IDEA).

We realized that the best path forward meant posing those questions publicly through a completely open and inclusive request for proposal (RFP) process that would not only identify the best partners, but would give us a better understanding of the landscape of those already engaged in the field to build an ecosystem beyond the three formal partners.

Crafting an Inclusive Process, Step by Step

With administrative support from GDI Partners (also identified through a local RFP process), we issued the RFP through extensive outreach across multiple networks. By January 2023, we had a robust pool of applicants and an engaged panel of jurors representing leaders in philanthropy, government, social impact, and academia. We are grateful to these key experts in helping us identify our first set of network partners in India:

• Abhishek Singh, President and CEO, National E-Governance Division (NeGD)
• Anna Agarwal, Visiting Professor – IIT-Kanpur; Researcher in Energy and Environment Policy
• Philipp Olbrich, Advisor, FAIR Forward, GIZ
• Neharika Vohra, Professor, IIM-Ahmedabad
• Shweta Narayan, International Climate and Health Campaigner, Healthcare Without Harm
• Santosh Harish, Program Officer, Open Philanthropy
• Uyi Stewart, Chief Data & Technology Officer, data.org

The evaluation was rigorous, and we sought feedback from the panel at every phase on items large and small, operational and strategic. Not surprisingly, their input and expertise were invaluable, and they helped uncover both pitfalls and opportunities as we progressed. 

Based on the jury’s co-created 25-point rubric, we methodically narrowed the candidates to six potential partners, including traditional technology and management universities as well as unconventional liberal arts and law schools.

After virtual conversations with the academicians and senior university administrators, the jury submitted their individual rubrics and recommendations and met together one last time to discuss, debate, and make a cohesive decision as a group — a decision we are excited to announce at a day-long convening to celebrate the launch of the India Accelerator on May 15.

Productivity Beyond the Process

While we are enormously excited that we identified three exceptional university partners through an open and inclusive process, we are especially proud of the lasting connections we made with the full pool of institutions, including those that did not progress.

At every phase of selection, applicants that did not qualify were given specific written feedback about their strengths and areas for growth and improvement, and we offered each an opportunity for an hour-long follow-on conversation to talk in further detail.

Through those conversations and exchanges, relationships were forged, ideas germinated, and a broader, more expansive ecosystem has begun to take shape across India — an ecosystem in which there is excitement, momentum, and a growing recognition of the need to grow and diversify the DSI talent pool. These partners share a commitment to engage with our efforts and exchange ideas and insights in the future through new training programs, fellowships, internships, and more. 

At data.org, we learned so much through this process, but among the most surprising and rewarding lessons was the value of the open RFP process. And as we work toward our goal of training one million purpose-driven data practitioners, we are excited to cultivate and learn from the powerful network of partners that has begun to take shape.   

The post Capacity Building: Creating an Open Invitation to Engage appeared first on data.org.

On their digital platform, data.org provides a free Data Maturity Assessment (DMA) to give SIOs the ability to assess their current data implementation strategies, identify opportunities for growth, and apply positive change through curated resources and guides from their Resource Library. This suite of self-service tools helps organizations become “data-led” to better meet their missions. The DMA is a key tool supporting the Capacity Accelerator Network (CAN), a data.org initiative dedicated to developing one million purpose-driven data professionals across the globe over the next decade, and empowering organizations with the analytical skills needed to thrive in a data-driven landscape.

“Social impact organizations have historically lacked the resources, tools, and capability to harness the power of data,” said Danil Mikhailov, executive director at data.org. “Our Data Maturity Assessment helps organizations chart a path forward in their data journey and prepares them for the kind of transformative growth that drives lasting impact.”

Microsoft Philanthropies’ two-year partnership includes:

• the next phase of the DMA tool with an expanded assessment and improved analytics. Microsoft’s robust network of SIOs will engage with the DMA to assess their organizational data maturity and connect to resources.
• a cohort program for a subset of SIOs to focus on data maturity transformation over a 12-month period with additional in-kind resources from Microsoft such as computing and engineering support, access to Microsoft products, and related technical assistance. Insights from this cohort will help identify approaches and resources to support the social impact sector at scale.

This investment will help generate a collection of key learnings and case studies, as well as a playbook to identify transformational models that could enable organizational change, contributing to the CAN initiative’s suite of open-source resources for the wider DSI sector.

“data.org continues to leverage its comprehensive platform to bring together the experience of social impact organizations, the strength and capabilities of Microsoft Philanthropies, and the power of data to derive insights and inform future digital resources,” said Mikhailov. “These insights will allow data.org to continue building a community of data-led organizations and unlock potential solutions to address some of the world’s most complex challenges including health, climate, and financial inclusion.”

“Microsoft is committed to empowering organizations with the tools, skills, and resources needed to succeed in the digital world,” said Kate Behncken, Vice President Microsoft Philanthropies. “We’re proud to work with data.org to strengthen the power of data to drive social good.”

About data.org: 

data.org is committed to democratizing data, for good. Founded by The Rockefeller Foundation and the Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth, data.org is a platform for partnerships, and works with organizations all over the world to increase the use of data science to tackle society’s most pressing challenges and improve the lives of millions of people. For more information, visit data.org and follow us on Twitter @datadotorg.

Media contacts: 

data.org: Emma Marty | emma@data.org  

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The explosion of online learning platforms, from YouTube channels by star educators to massive open online courses (MOOCs) to platforms like DataCamp and Zindi, has democratized how tech-savvy youth learn data science skills. A simple internet search reveals countless blog posts by data enthusiasts showcasing their technical skills in statistics and machine learning using readily available datasets that may not be domain-specific or representative of global issues. However, talking to many of the same enthusiasts reveals a common frustration: how do I apply these skills to solve “real,” meaningful challenges?

Take the case of Stacy Kozlovska, a data enthusiast from Chrenivtsi, Ukraine who began her data science journey as an active member of Google Summer of Code. After earning an undergraduate degree in marketing and philology, Stacy taught herself data science and joined online forums to build her data skills. She wanted to apply the same skills in education, a sector she deeply cares about, and with Ukrainian youth in particular. However, the lack of access to datasets, mentorship, and scant research opportunities was a hindrance. These problems are exacerbated in teaching or learning Data Science for Social Impact (DSSI). “It’s one thing to learn a set of tools and apply them to well-curated datasets available online. It’s another game to deal with real-world datasets that are messy and incomplete. A data science education is incomplete without engaging with these real-world datasets,” she says.   

Integrating Data Science Education with Domain Expertise

As the need for data scientists across domains—from healthcare to climate change to finance to the public sector—continues to grow around the world, there is an urgent need to re-imagine how data science is taught. While most data science courses focus on core statistical tools, they fail to provide adequate exposure to domain knowledge for context-specific challenges in gathering, cleaning, and understanding data. Thus a data professional who is quite skilled at applying the latest tools to carefully curated datasets used for instruction might find it daunting when faced with messy datasets in the real world. Besides, understanding the nuances of data collection and cleaning is central to gleaning the correct insights from data. Additionally, domain expertise would allow one to ask the most relevant questions about the data being worked on.

“Understanding ‘first problems’ in data—how it is sampled, cleaned, and labeled—is the barrier to becoming an effective data scientist,” says, Dr. Bhasi Nair, Director of Data Science at EquiTech Futures, where he develops new project-based data science curricula. “Training the next generation of effective data scientists requires us to equip them not only with the latest statistical tools but also with the ability to “think like a scientist” about how data is collected and to have the intellectual agility to learn about a new domain with which they may not be familiar.”

It takes time to help new talent build an interdisciplinary lens in engaging with data. A recent report on Workforce Wanted: Data Talent for Social Impact released by data.org, Patrick J. McGovern Foundation, and Dalberg, through a review of nearly 200 data talent initiatives and expert interviews with over 30 leaders, reveals that short-term training programs, boot camps or fellowships under three months have limited impact on learning outcomes. These program types may not run for sufficient time to cultivate a “data mindset,” which requires experiential learning by engagement with sector-specific challenges.

Emphasizing Experiential Learning

Many online and tech training programs have been criticized for lack of alignment with sector demands from impact-focused organizations. Programs that offer internship placements or practical capstone projects to complement in-class teaching demonstrate a greater propensity to support professionals in securing work. For example, Laboratoria in Latin America engages its extensive network of partner companies throughout the training period in delivering talks, providing feedback on student-run projects, judging the final hack-a-thons, and participating in recruiting events. The trust this builds with employers over time and the opportunity it grants them to interact with students on multiple occasions are key drivers of Laboratoria’s high placement rates in high-quality jobs.

An experiential curriculum can be a crucial differentiator between learners who are job-ready and those who are not. Connections with social impact organizations (SIOs) or government agencies to engage with real-world data challenges early on has dual benefits: to help students learn soft skills and gauge the professional world while making participating in supporting SIOs more data-driven.

The IDEA Challenge: Democratise DS education while facilitating effective learning

A study by Dalberg and Intel, Decoding Diversity: The Financial and Economic Returns to Diversity in Tech shows that improving ethnic and gender diversity in the workforce could create USD 470 to USD 570B in new value for the tech industry and could add 1.2 to 1.6% to national GDP. Cathy O’Neil’s book, Weapons of Math Destruction highlights how mathematical models or algorithms that claim to quantify important traits often have harmful outcomes and reinforce inequality (e.g., by encoding racism or other biases into algorithms).

As the legal scholar, Kimberlé Crenshaw, through her theoretical framework of intersectionality posits that multiple social categories (e.g., race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, etc.) intersect at the micro level of individual experience to reflect multiple interlocking systems of privilege and oppression at the macro, social-structural level (e.g., racism, sexism, heterosexism). While the underlying drivers of exclusion are many, very few pathways reveal initiatives that intentionally focus on building and shaping an IDEA (Inclusivity, Diversity, Equity, Access) ecosystem. IDEA can be a foundational asset in advancing access to, the value of, and the impact of DSSI talent initiatives.

An example of this is the Financial Inclusion Accelerator established by data.org and the University of Chicago’s Data Science Institute with a consortium of seven other diverse higher education partners including Hispanic Serving Institutes (HSIs), Minority Serving Institutes (MSIs) and Historically Black Colleges & Universities (HBCUs), and that adopts an IDEA lens at its core. These partners are working collaboratively to create a modular, experiential curriculum that will be accessible to a diverse community of students, that could fundamentally change who ‘sits behind the computer’ and has the power to process the data, analyze it and tell stories through insights from that data.

Looking Ahead

As the Workforce Wanted: Data Talent for Social Impact report highlights, if the latent demand in the social impact space is stimulated, there is potential to cultivate 3.5 million data professionals in the next 10 years. It is up to us to create a diverse and inclusive workforce by ensuring interdisciplinary teaching with domain expertise along with technical skills, experiential learning through engagement with SIOs, and being intentional about IDEA. The opportunity is up for grabs as we build the field of data science for social impact.

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With this grant, data.org will work with the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development Data and J-PAL South Asia to establish new accelerators in Sub-Saharan Africa and India. The accelerators will equip emerging data professionals with the interdisciplinary skills needed to work at the intersection of climate and health to tackle society’s greatest challenges and improve lives across the world. 

“Data is crucial for helping us understand and tackle the health effects of climate change. But right now, the field lacks people with the necessary skills and expertise, particularly within the communities that live on the frontlines of the climate crisis. We must train a new generation of data practitioners to address the health impacts of climate change where it matters most. That’s why we’re pleased to support data.org with the accelerators in India and Sub-Saharan Africa — to help bridge gaps in the field and create meaningful solutions that improve lives,” said Tariq Khokhar, head of data for science and health at Wellcome. 

Wellcome’s transformative grant will advance data.org’s ambitious mission to train one million purpose-driven data practitioners over the next decade, as it leads global efforts to strengthen data talent in the social impact sector. This initiative builds on data.org’s recent partnership with the University of Chicago’s Financial Inclusion Accelerator, made possible by funding from the Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth.  

The announcement comes during the 77^th session of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) and will reinforce efforts to create an enabling environment for equitable, inclusive, and timely policymaking and service delivery in India and Sub-Saharan Africa. Underlining the importance of investing in data systems, new Dalberg research—commissioned by the United Nations, The World Bank, and the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development Data—shows that for every $1 USD invested in data systems and skills, there is $32 USD  worth of benefit.   

“At data.org, we believe in democratizing data, for good. Creating a network of capacity accelerators around the world puts that concept into action, informing, training, and mobilizing the next generation of data professionals,” said Danil Mikhailov, executive director of data.org. “Against a backdrop of the climate crisis, pandemics, and rising inequality, the world faces enormous, systemic challenges. Data science and other data-driven technologies can offer part of the solution through their tremendous ability to scale, but only if we ensure these data professionals are equipped with the interdisciplinary skills to ask the right questions and build trust with the communities they serve.” 

The first capacity accelerator will be based in Sub-Saharan Africa in collaboration with the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development Data (GPSDD), followed by the launch of a second accelerator in India in collaboration with Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL) South Asia. Both delivery partners have proven experience and deep networks, particularly with local stakeholders in their respective geographies, enabling them to create scalable and sustainable global impact. As a platform for partnerships, data.org has consistently demonstrated its ability to connect partners across the world and foster collaboration that drives collective change. These programs will do the same, resulting in a set of open-source resources, including modular curricula, made available to social impact professionals worldwide. 

“To achieve better outcomes for people and the planet, we as the international data community need to collaborate to make technical skills and knowledge more accessible to all. The Global Partnership is working to help governments address information gaps in climate, health, and vital statistics. Partnering with data.org, J-PAL South Asia, and a constellation of education providers will help collectively leverage our networks to strengthen local data talent, which in turn will help unlock solutions to the world’s most pressing environmental and social challenges” said Claire Melamed, chief executive officer at the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development Data. 

Each accelerator will produce a cohort of data practitioners with interdisciplinary subject-matter expertise in health and climate data. In surrounding communities, dozens of social impact and public sector organizations will reap the benefits, hosting paid data fellows who graduate from the program. 

“The fight against poverty and climate change is more data-driven than ever before, and scalable, rigorous technical training is needed to build capacity to use data for evidence-informed decision-making. The accelerator represents a unique opportunity to build talent and impact the future of data use for research and policy, in India and worldwide, through this collaborative partnership between data.org and J-PAL South Asia,” said Iqbal Dhaliwal, global executive director at J-PAL. 

Accelerators will partner with universities and other social impact and public sector organizations that will support the research and roll out of curriculum, resources, and experiential learning programs, in an effort to engage top talent in social impact—a consistent challenge for the sector. A recent report from data.org and the Patrick J. McGovern Foundation, “Workforce Wanted: Data Talent for Social Impact,” found that there is an opportunity to develop 3.5 million data professionals focused on social impact in low- and middle-income countries over the next 10 years. 

“No one can do this work alone, but together, we can build a diverse workforce of purpose-driven data practitioners, advancing social impact. We invite funders, social impact organizations, academia, and government to join us,” added Mikhailov. 

About Wellcome 

Wellcome supports science to solve the urgent health challenges facing everyone. We support discovery research into life, health and wellbeing, and we’re taking on three worldwide health challenges: mental health, global heating and infectious diseases. 

About Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL): 

The Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL) is a global research center working to reduce poverty by ensuring that policy is informed by scientific evidence. Anchored by a network of 262 affiliated professors at universities around the world, J-PAL conducts randomized impact evaluations to answer critical questions in the fight against poverty. 

About The Global Partnership for Sustainable Development Data (GPSDD): 

The Global Partnership for Sustainable Development Data is a fast-growing, dynamic international partnership bringing together over 650 different organizations including governments, UN agencies, private companies, civil society organizations, and many others. The Global Partnership convenes, connects, and catalyzes action to address the problems of poor data use, access, quality, and production, and to work with stakeholders to fully harness the new opportunities of the data revolution in the service of sustainable development. The Global Partnership aims to link and align action, capacities, and resources across geographies, sectors, and data communities. 

About data.org: 

data.org is committed to democratizing data, for good. Founded by The Rockefeller Foundation and the Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth, data.org is a platform for partnerships, and works with organizations all over the world to increase the use of data science to tackle society’s most pressing challenges and improve the lives of millions of people. For more information, visit data.org and follow us on Twitter @datadotorg. 

Media contacts: 

data.org:
Emma Marty | emma@data.org 

Global Partnership for Sustainable Development Data:
Jennifer Oldfield | joldfield@data4sdgs.org  

J-PAL:
Evan Williams | ewilliams@povertyactionlab.org 

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“Today, we stand at the edge of possibility.”

That powerful imagery from Dr. Ronda Železný-Green, program director of the Capacity Accelerator Network at data.org, kicked off a globally-attended webinar to release a first-of-its-kind new report, “Workforce Wanted: Data Talent for Social Impact.”

Workforce Wanted is informed by a review of 200 data talent initiatives around the world, 90 articles and reports, and more than 30 expert interviews, led by data.org and The Patrick J. McGovern Foundation, in collaboration with Dalberg and with support from the Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth. 

Železný-Green points out that while social impact organizations are at the forefront of serving communities and improving lives, they continue to lag behind the private sector when it comes to using the power of data to advance change. Leveraging that power is the motivation behind the report, which speaks to the challenges and opportunities, success stories and gaps that must be addressed to create a stronger and more diverse talent pipeline to lead this work forward.

“The report shows the critical need and the tremendous opportunity for global data talent to enable the social sector to harness the power of data to solve the world’s most pressing problems,” said Mamadou Biteye, executive secretary for the African Capacity Building Foundation and moderator for the event. 

In the next decade, there could be as many as 3.5 million job opportunities in data science for social impact in low- and middle-income countries. But to get there, there is a lot of work to be done. 

An Emerging Field at a Crossroads

When Claudia Juech, vice president of data and society at The Patrick J. McGovern Foundation, started on this kind of work five years ago, the conversations in the field were still heavily focused on the ‘why.’ Why is data science important? Why should we invest? 

The case has been sufficiently made, but social impact organizations continue to struggle with the ‘how.’ 

“We are now shifting. Now it is about ‘where is the talent that we need to do that work?’” Juech said. “‘How do we implement?’” 

In particular, organizations are often missing the ‘who.’ They lack the people power to maximize the use of data. Existing staff don’t have the skills, and attracting talent is difficult when competing with private sector peers that often advertise higher-paying jobs with bigger teams and more extensive records of data science investment.

“Through this report, our goal was really to articulate and better understand where the field is today and the scale of the opportunity ahead,” said Ginger Zielinskie, senior advisor at data.org, a lead author of the report, and a former social impact practitioner who has long seen the looming gap with data science staffing. “Talent continued to come up as an underpinning of each challenge we sought to solve.”

The Workforce Wanted project team identified four pathways to expand the talent pool in data for social impact:

1. New talent, or attracting early career professionals into the field through educational and workforce development pathways. Traditional programs often lack exposure to the social impact sector, so forging those connections is key.
2. Existing talent, or upskilling and reskilling workers who are already in the sector. They have already opted into mission-driven work. With the challenges around attracting and retaining this talent already solved, what can it look like when you give them opportunities for growth and development in data science? 
3. Transitional talent, or creating on-ramps that allow for greater exposure and access to employment opportunities. Hands-on fellowships, short courses, volunteer opportunities, and rotational leadership programs are all examples of how to support this pipeline.
4. Leadership, or helping those at the top of organizations to commit to the change process and implement meaningful approaches to build data-led cultures. 

Early on in the webinar, attendees were asked to identify the most important pathway, and the results were compelling. The four pathways  were neck and neck at 25, 24, 23, and 28 percent, respectively. 

In other words, they are seen as equally important, illustrating how much work has to be done across the board. 

“I was absolutely surprised by how early we are; by how much information and knowledge we still need to uncover and gain and aggregate and share and learn from,” Zielinskie said. “We have not yet used data and data science to our fullest potential. The opportunity is so massive.”

Finding the Right Talent

In an exhaustive review of the data talent landscape, the Workforce Wanted team heard over and over that there were not enough data talent professionals. More educational and training opportunities are needed, including university degree programs. Greater investment is needed to improve a growing number of ​​non-traditional training models, including massive open online courses (MOOCs), which have demonstrated varying degrees of efficacy. Leadership needs the opportunity to train and develop themselves in order to scale up what works and create institutional buy-in. And across all of these efforts, organizations must also consider the digital divide, and which communities do—or do not—have access to foundational tools like the internet and technology.

It isn’t just a question of having enough talent or enough training, either; it’s a question of having the right talent.

“The social impact sector sees the potential to use data and data science more effectively to tackle literally the hardest problems in the globe. The question is how do we use this powerful tool responsibly?” Zielinskie asks, calling out the most important theme of the report: lack of diversity. “If we actually want to build equity-centered data science solutions, we have to be proactive in focusing on building an inclusive and diverse workforce.”

The values of inclusion, diversity, equity, and accessibility (IDEA) are generally acknowledged as important, yet not enough has been done to embed them in the field in a meaningful way. When considering the strategies listed above for expanding workforce development, Juech points out that these strategies must be developed in a way that specifically addresses attracting and retaining more diverse talent.

“It’s important that we think about diversity of data professionals because we know that data fairness is better achievable if the people who work on data, clean data, analyze data, really represent the communities and the contexts where the data originates from,” she said. 

In 2021, The Patrick J. McGovern Foundation invested more than $10 million in workforce development initiatives, focusing heavily on working not just with individuals, but with teams and organizations. This nuance is important, as it ensures that capacity building does not live with a single person; it becomes integrated into systems and is therefore more sustainable. It shifts from individual projects to systems-level thinking. 

That intentionality, Juech adds, is essential at every stage of the process. She often hears leaders say, for example, that they post data talent jobs but do not receive applications from candidates from historically underrepresented communities. Organizations must take responsibility and hold themselves accountable, expanding outreach efforts and peeling back the onion another layer to ask what other benefits, flexibility, or support could make a position more attractive for both external and internal candidates.

“Be intentional about who you hire, who you promote, and who you offer growth opportunities to in nonprofit organizations,” she said.

Putting Money Where Your Mouth Is

Building capacity requires intentionality. It also requires investment. Funders must ask organizations about the makeup of their teams and begin to distribute funds to signal that this isn’t just a nice to have—it’s a priority. 

At the organizational level, that can be a harder decision than it seems. When presented with a choice between providing direct services to communities or investing in digital infrastructure and data capacity, Zielinskie understands why data science often takes a back-burner.

But an investment today can yield dividends in the future.

“To train this next generation of talent to develop mechanisms to support the upskilling within organizations, to build clearer and porous pipelines between the technology sector and the social impact sector, and to support leaders in driving this transformation, we have to get real about the capital required,” she said.

She and Juech and the rest of the Workforce Wanted team are hopeful that this report will help spark an increased investment, and improve coordination across academia, philanthropy, social impact practitioners, and partners in the tech for good space. There are emerging bright spots, and wherever there is a lesson to be learned, it’s essential that best practices and effective strategies be shared. 

The momentum is growing, as long as cross-sector partners are willing to double down and get serious about building a stronger and more diverse talent pipeline.

“Be curious about what the data has to really tell you,”Zielinskie said. “Be agile enough to evolve and opportunistic enough to take advantage, and we can drive this change forward.” 

To learn more about building data talent capacity, watch the full webinar online and download and read the full report, “Workforce Wanted: Data Talent for Social Impact.” You can also access the data.org Resource Library, and get your organization started with the data.org Data Maturity Assessment.

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Workforce Wanted clarifies what is needed to identify, cultivate, support, and retain a diverse workforce of data professionals to solve the world’s most pressing challenges, such as climate change, healthcare disparities, food insecurity, and lack of financial inclusion. The report explores four potential pathways — new talent, existing talent, transitional talent, and leadership — to develop a robust workforce of data professionals. 

“Data-driven nonprofits face a critical resource gap: experienced data professionals with lived experience of communities around the world,” said Claudia Juech, Vice President of Data and Society at the Patrick J. McGovern Foundation. “Building a diverse and deep talent pool will equip social change organizations to reduce bias within data, unearth better insights, and enable improved decision-making on serious issues facing humanity.”

Through a review of nearly 200 data talent initiatives, a literature review of approximately 90 articles and reports, expert interviews with 30+ leaders across the globe, and extensive desk research, this report surveys the current state of data training and talent initiatives and culminates in this landscape analysis of the sector’s challenges.

Together, PJMF and data.org tapped the research capabilities and global network of Dalberg to produce this sector-defining report, and to explore what is needed to shape an inclusive, diverse, equitable, and accessible (IDEA) talent base of data professionals driving social impact. “The Workforce Wanted report provides an important foundation for understanding how building a diverse generation of data professionals is essential for advancing socioeconomic goals. Across low and middle-income countries, our conservative estimate is that there is potential to create a cohort of 3.5 million data professionals focused on social impact.” said Robin Miller, regional director for Africa, and global digital & data practice lead at Dalberg.

“In advancing the purpose-driven data talent workforce, we must act boldly to ensure better and more access to training and upskilling opportunities for women, people of color, and people from different economic backgrounds and conditions. This mission calls for partnerships across sectors—social impact organizations, government, philanthropy, academia, and tech—to develop, foster, and unlock data talent. This report illuminates the opportunity to align on shared goals and create a plan which is both achievable and ambitious. Together we can build and empower a workforce and a social sector that can harness the power of data to benefit everyone, everywhere.” said Ginger Zielinskie, senior advisor at data.org.

About data.org:

data.org is committed to democratizing data, for good. Founded by The Rockefeller Foundation and the Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth, data.org is a platform for partnerships, and works with organizations all over the world to increase the use of data science to tackle society’s most pressing challenges and improve the lives of millions of people. For more information, visit data.org and follow us on Twitter @datadotorg.

About The Patrick J. McGovern Foundation:

The Patrick J. McGovern Foundation is a global 21^st century philanthropy bridging the frontiers of artificial intelligence, data science, and social impact to create a thriving, equitable and sustainable future for all. The Foundation’s work focuses on bringing together academia, practitioners, and civil society to pursue the potential of AI and data science to address some of the world’s most urgent challenges.

About Dalberg:

Dalberg is an impact advisory group that brings together strategy consulting, design thinking, big data analytics, and research to address complex social and environmental challenges. We work collaboratively with communities, institutions, governments, and corporations to develop solutions that create impact at scale. With more than 29 locations worldwide and a diverse footprint, Dalberg is driven by a mission to build a world where all people, everywhere, can reach their full potential. For more information, visit www.dalberg.com.

Media contact :

George Mastoras
george.mastoras@mcgovern.org
(914) 489-5282

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