First. Us. Raiders. On test. Test testing. Ones who. Hi. Everyone we're gonna get started in about five minutes so please take your seats. Hello. Good afternoon everyone. Hello. Welcome. To demo day we, are so, grateful and to have you all here we're really excited to get. Started and showcase all the amazing work that a bunch of companies and agencies have been, doing over the course of this year. I'm drew Zachary I'm the director and co-founder of the opportunity, project and, aymara Abrams managing, director of census, open innovation, labs. So. Before. We get into the. Talks we want to skip all of you upfront and just make sure that you guys can get right into hearing from all, of the teams who have built amazing products this year but we wanted to give you a quick overview of what the agenda is gonna look like for today so. We're gonna start with some leadership remarks, from our leadership, here at the Department of Commerce and the Census Bureau and then, we'll have a series of lightning talks from you. May have noticed all the tables set up at the back which you will actually get to interact with and test out later but we'll. Hear some lightning talks from the people who have participated in the opportunity, project over the course of this year and, then we'll have a very exciting, fireside, chat which will, not have a fire but. Will have really exciting agency, leadership from across the agencies that we've worked with this year. And. I'll. Turn it over tomorrow to talk a little bit about social media and we are live, streaming today yes. So as you, mentioned we're live streamed, and, we also highly, encourage social, media the, hashtag, is hashtag. Opportunity. Projects, so please do, leverage. Your social media networks to get the word out about this great event. So. Now, I'm gonna go into exactly. What the opportunity, project is the. Opportunity, project is. A process, that was started two years ago, by. Which government. And, communities. And Technology. The. Tech industry, can all collaborate, together to. Build, digital products. That, increase. American, Economic Opportunity. And, some of them. So. The, reason. That I was started, are, three, primary things and it comes down. To people. So, it's about this, is really the heart of it it's about empowering. People, with technology, and, showing the power of the data to really improve people's lives. Next. We're making data more, making. Government data, more accessible. And, by. Partnering. With the tech industry, we're. Able to do that a lot better. And. Finally. This is about collaboration so, we're. Creating a lightweight. Pathway, by which you, know the. People. Can work together across different sectors and industries. So. Open, innovation, you're gonna hear this term quite a bit, this. Simply means looking. Beyond our own walls to be able to be able to solve some of our, key challenges. So. Open innovation, is really about bringing kind of outside. Expertise. Outside innovators. In. So. That we can solve some of our challenges together and, this is a perfect, example of open innovation this, is about sensus. Collaborating. With. Outside. Companies government, you know different. Federal. Agencies as, well as tech companies universities etc. Etc. So. I think we've lost our visual here but while, we're waiting to get it back we also wanted to just do a quick poll of who, is in the room today, so. Who's. From a tech company. Okay. A lot of tech companies, how. About federal, government. Local. And state government.
Ok. University, is. Philanthropy. Foundations. Awesome. Anybody else that we missed want, to throw. Something else in the mix. Okay. Community-based. Organizations. Community-based, organizations, and advocacy anybody, else great. Ok awesome so. We. Have a really diverse group here and before, we turn, it over to the to our leadership to talk more about that I just wanted to point out that all, of the people who are in the room today are the people that we work with and the opportunity, project and to just. You a little bit better sense of, what. This actually means over. The last few months ten, companies. Five. Agencies, and, a bunch of community, organizations, and cities have been working in a collaborative tech. Development, sprint process, so this is what open innovation, looks like in practice we. Pull all these people together in a process for 12 weeks and they build new tools together in the open and. Human centered design is, a really important part of that process it's, something that we value here at the Census Bureau and that all of our partners do as well and that means pairing, up tech companies with user advocates, and people who really are on the ground and know these issues very intimately, and can help to design technology, with open data that's really going to benefit the end user. Since. We've started this process two. Years ago we've, followed. That sprint process for 18 different problems, we've, worked with 10 federal agencies, and, over 15, cities and local governments, and over. 50, digital, tools have been created, through this collaboration, and you're gonna hear about ten of the the latest ones that created just over the last six months today. So, we. Will get right into that as soon as possible and, first I want, to turn it over to our undersecretary. For Economic Affairs from the Department of Commerce, Karen Don Kelly or. Incredible great incredibly, grateful for her leadership and the fact that she is here today to talk a little bit about more, about why this is so important, to the Department of Commerce. Thank. You drew Thank You, Mara. For well. They're leaving the stage goodbye then we'll say goodbye, thank. You and goodbye you'll you'll, hear from them later and. Also, want to thank Ron, Jarmon, and I Rika Lamas for their. Support and help both through the census. I'm. Actually very thrilled, and an honor to be, here today, I have personally. In my professional. Career been a consumer. Of the, data that has been produced, by.
So, Many of the bureau's I have also been on the edge of what. Is the best technology, to get and use that data so this really for me personally. And. It, is a very very exciting. Combination. And, the partnership, between public. And private also. Makes it even more compelling, I also, want to share with you that secretary. Ross, also. Is committed to the improving, and timeless, timeliness. And use, of accurate, data so, this is really very important, to everything that we're doing at, commerce so. We're, here today as as I said to see the 10 new tools that were created, on top, of the, 40 that you've already had the opportunity to see before but. Really more broadly and more importantly, we're, here today to shed, a spotlight. On the. Products, that, can come to bear when we work together across, sectors. Leverage. Our diverse skill sets and try, to tackle problems rapidly. And, creatively, by using the best data and, technology. That we have to bear, Commerce. Has been leading this project since January, and under. Our leadership, we've engaged 10. Tech companies, five, agencies. Dozens. Of local law and can be local, and community organizations. Universities. Advocacy. Pro, and, others that were just mentioned before and I hope I didn't, miss any and some, people in the audience are saying with white commerce why was commerce involved in this well we, are actually known as America's. Data Agency. The, bureau's, underneath. Census, consists, of noah b, EA nist. And of course census. And, what we do is we collect and maintain data, on the nation's GDP whether. Land. People. Neighborhoods. And so much more so, we were really think, that we're at the, the spot in which it was important, to make this happen, the. Project, the opportunities, project, was really founded to help us reach across sectors, and to, collaborate on problem, solving the. Real value, is not just, in creating, the, best data that a government creat can create across the globe but. It's building the partnership. To, unleash, that data, to. Help both nationally. And locally and. That's, what. This is all about and. We can accomplish that so much more effectively, and efficiently, by. Working together by, bringing the, design talents, of the private sector the technologists. Outside. Of the government together. With the government to make it happen the, data is, only as valuable as, the tools, that, make it available to the consumer and when we think about it in that and that dynamic, it's, very clear why this group, is so important, the. Data that was used was, not only created, by census, and the Department of Congress, but. Commerce. But also the. Department of Education, OMB. Treasury. The VA and, HUD and. I and I want to just recognize and, if you could raise your hand since we had right hand raising before how many of those groups are here today, and. What's. Nice about about. This as we heard about and we saw the hands raised before how, many people are here from the federal government here how many here from tech companies, they're, intermingled.
So You can see that, this IQ, compounding. Is already is already happening I also, want, to thank the. Fellow agencies, because they've already committed, to, working with us on the opportunities, project not only for what they've done in the past but, what they're going to continue, to do the, department, is really very very excited, about this project and we are really, very excited. To continue to build an environment. For collaboration, and learning across the agency. I hope. If. I have a hope I hope, that as you go through and you see these, new. Solutions, today and you get excited you not only are inspired, by them but you really have a call to action as to how can I be involved to, take this even to the next level because it's that collaboration, that will make this work and at this point I'd like to turn it over to Ron Jarmon, to talk more about the, census and their work on the project. Well, well thank you Karen and it's good to see all of you here today I'm. Really exciting that to. Talk about this. So. As. Karen said the Commerce Department is very supportive, of the. Opportunity, project in particular and the Census Bureau's efforts, at innovation, more broadly and so we really appreciate that, so. You, know that census we like to think and. We try hard to be a leader in innovation, I'm. Not sure we always succeed, in that but, I think the opportunity, project is an example of how, we. Are. Started. Moving out and some useful ways. To sort of improve the. Usefulness, of the products that we provide to the public. So. You know we do have a unique mandate. To reach every, citizen, of the. Of the country and in. Where, they are and what, they're doing and so I think the opportunity, project is a excellent. Example, of trying to combine. The. Data that we collect with, the right tools to, reach people, where, they are to make make. Their lives better so. Today. We're going to talk about you know 10 new 21st, century tools. This. Is I think, just. The tip of the iceberg, of what we can accomplish using. The model that that. The.
Opportunity, Project brings to bear so. I think thing, was Martha said you're gonna hear the term open, innovation. Several times today, and I think that's a critical part of this. The. Census Bureau can't, do its job without the help of the. Citizens. And businesses, in America, first, of all we. Need your. Help to, give us the the raw materials, with which we make the data products that we provide back. To you but. Perhaps most, of all we need to know what problems, are. Important. To you so that we can make sure that the data that we're providing address. Those problems and I think the. Examples, that you're gonna see today are an, effort to try to marry, the, problem, with, the data with, the tool and that's, what's particularly. Innovate. About this. So. You. Know I think one of the one of the great. Aspects. Of what you're gonna see today is the. Use of technology, to make the data available. You, know in the past we used to we used to collect the data and, publish, it in books that sat in libraries. And so. The data were useful. You. Know to the people who had access to libraries. You. Know primarily. Researchers. And sort, government officials, and what-have-you. But through the use of api's, and digital, tools were, pushing the data out, to the to, the every you. Know citizen, in the country and I think that's you, know what's particularly. Engaging. About this for me. So. You're gonna hear about two challenges, today, we. Had that. We asked the tech teams to address. The. Census challenge, was. How we might create digital tools that enable, individuals, and communities, to see, and experience the value of the census, in. Order to increase participation and, engagement again, this sort of open. Innovation well, how can we get the, sort of feedback loops from from. The people we're serving, that. Both improve the data and improve, the tools. From. The White House in OMB and Treasury, the. Challenge is how we might create. Digital. Tools to make federal grants, more, user-friendly for, local. Leaders. So. You, know the best and most innovative solution of these problems. Result. From from, people working, together from, across disciplines with with the right sorts of expertise, and subject. Matter knowledge. You. Know whether it comes from from. A government agency whether it comes from a tech company a community-based. Organization, or what have you so with. That I'm, done, talking, and that we can get to the actual meat, of the program I'm sorry that Karen and I are gonna have to run. Upstairs to, take care of census problems. But. Wish, we could stay here and and, and play with all the tools with you but we know that we can play with them later too so thank, you very much. Thank. You so much again to Karen and Ron I, just wanted to pause, for a moment before we start the lightning talks I think there are some folks who are lined up on the sides waiting, to take a seat please, please. Come take a seat there's plenty of space for you. Don't. Be shy so, while we're waiting for people I'm. Going to turn it over now to Eric Coyle who's gonna start off our lightning talks and as. Ron just explained, there were four different problems, that these tech companies and communities, set, out to tackle this year so you're, gonna hear from someone. Who has expertise, from, the ground level, experiencing. That problem, to help us understand, what the problem is and why that's important, and then the tech companies will take it over and talk about the solutions, that they've developed so I'll turn it over to Eric. Great. Okay. Thank. You drew and thank, you all for coming today and so. These. Are going to be very quick short, lightning talks so as, our, acting. Director pointed out mr. Jarmon. The. Tech teams here were presented with a particular census challenge, in regard to how do we increase partition. Participation. Rates in, the 2020, census, but, not only that but also how do we increase awareness of, the data, and. Get them to experience. And, interact, with our data as well, so, when I think about this.
Challenge. And the problem statement associated, with that challenge a, particular, quote, comes. To mind one of my favorite quotes actually by the former, CEO of Netscape Jim Barksdale, who. Said that. If we have the. Data let's. Look at the data but. If all we have our opinions then, let's go with mine. Now. The. Reason why that's one of my favorite quotes is because it actually. Exemplifies. The. Importance, of data-driven. Decisions, and the. Need to have quality data, to, make those, data-driven decisions. So. In order, to get that quality data, we. Need participation. It's. Imperative that we get participation, in all, of our surveys and censuses to, produce the quality data to help people make those data-driven decisions. So. Again it's not just a regard to the 2020 census, but, also in regard to our, surveys. And programs out there which. Account, for over 130 through. The course of a year. So. The, challenge, is for. These tech teams is to create innovative, tools to. Not, just engage with our normal data users out there who are already aware and familiar, with our data but really the general public, how do we get the general public out there that, doesn't really isn't really familiar with our data it doesn't really normally interact with our data very, often or doesn't even understand, the benefits, of how the data relates to their community, whether, it's funding for schools or hospitals or roads, whether. It's small, business owners using our data for market research there's. Lots of different ways we can educate the public so. Through, the opportunity, projects, we. Are meeting this challenge and. Very. Excited, to. Pass. On the mic so we can quickly get to seeing how some of these challenges, this challenge these particular challenges, are being met so. Thank you all very much and, I will now pass, it on to our. Team from Cisco. Hi. There everybody I'm a Suzy we I'm from Cisco dev net you. Probably know who cisco is but you may not know what dev net is definite. Is Cisco's, Developer, Program. Shuba, Koval and I are here to speak and we have two parts to the talk one is kind of why a cisco here and working with the opportunity, project and how we're working with more Andrew and then, Shuba will go into the project itself so. So. Just to kind of quickly speak the. Slide before yes, so. I there's. Actually a big industry transformation. Going on in the technology, world right now which. Is in the problem that Eric was just talking about we want to count and reach all of the population. But. If you think about it there's a lot of transformation, going on in the, roads that, communication. Tools that whole infrastructure, that exists, but, in addition there's a transformation, in the network. Infrastructure, the technology, that underlies it and we, think that that underlying, technology, that. The network provides can, actually help us with this big problem there's. A change in the programmability, of the network the way that people are connecting, using wireless, technology is the way that they're accessing, the web and through, all of this we, can actually use these tools to, get a better account of what's going on, we've.
Built Out we cisco has a very large ecosystem, of partners around the world who are connecting, networks and, providing. This infrastructure, as we. Founded cisco definite four years ago what we're doing is trying to advance everybody. It's, a developer, program where we're teaching them the software skills that all of the IT and network operators, around the world need to pick up to. Be able to prove, that next generation Network, and, what. Happens is the network not only provides, connectivity now but it has information the. Wireless network knows how many people are here in this room right now because, everyone probably has a wireless device a mobile device that's connected that. Can actually be used to generate interesting. Data, so. You. Know whenever you connect to wireless you, get data whenever you're you. Know using collaboration. Tools you get data we, think that this can be matched up with all of the open data that's available and, existing, out there and, so, what we wanted to do was to tie Cisco's, developer, community, in dev net we have four hundred and thirty thousand, developers, around the world who work at places like FedEx, and Boeing, and you, know Costa Rica you, know network partners, and everything there and we, wanted to bring them together to solve, now social. And community, problems and so, we teamed up because, we reached out to say how can we solve community. Problems I, actually, reached out Megan. Smith who was CTO, under, the prior administration, she. Connected, me into a number of folks including Mara, and Dru and they, said why don't you take a look at this opportunity, project so. Our goal is to kind of take all, of the people who are working on network and IT infrastructures. Around the world have, them help to solve and work on important, societal and community problems like this and this. Is where we started this great, collaboration. Drew. Has participated in, our dev net events with Cisco and has interacted, in many folks here and now. We've actually jumped in on this actual opportunity, project sprint, and Shuba gova will talk about the problem that we solved. Thank. You Susie so. This, was a great opportunity, no, pun intended for, us to work on the, problem, of sensors, low, response, rate one. Of the things that we found early, on working. With Eric, and Logan. And Drew was, this, tool which was already there it's called story map and as. We started looking at story map most, of our developer, audience as Suzy mentioned 430 thousands, of those these, are techies, we. First looked at the map in our area, which is let's, look around Silicon. Valley where our headquarter, is. And there was a big, green. Spot which. Represented. Very low response rate. And. This was also, representing. A another, problem, which, is a lot of the mobile, millennials in our areas, or devs or students, this. Population. Is not very aware of, data. Plus. They are not, to, make it usable they need to know where, to find it how to use it and why, they should care about so.
Starting. With that we, did lot of work with the stakeholder, local, stakeholders. In the valley as well. As data, analysts, from census, we. Created, a learning. Game that. Will help them talk. A lot more about or, learn about these, data sets that are relevant to solve a problem so let me quickly go through that. Few. Views of this game and we'll be live behind at the demo. The. Users, can be, the data superhero. Pick. And after, go. Through an emergency in this case there's a fire alarm specifically. In, Chinatown. And San, Francisco so, there's some relevant, data to look. At and worry about and, they. Have to find that hidden. In this map, and will, let you play with it more and the at the back as well as it's. Going live today it's available on, developer.android.com. And. Help with Eric that, they can learn how to use census, data and, also, learn about Cisco api's things, like Cisco Meraki that, can help scan. Location. Scanning can tell you the, people in the neighborhood if there's a fire how. To reach them where they might be so just. A quick demo from Cisco. Definite team thanks, everyone. And everyone I'm Laura Laderman and I'm a data analyst, at measure of America, a nonpartisan, nonprofit, project, of, the Social Science Research Council, based, in Brooklyn New York at measure America, we really live and breathe census, data using. It to produce reports and tools on well-being, and access to opportunity, for communities, across the country so. We have a really clear sense of the value of an accurate census, count but. The task for all of us here today is to communicate that value to the public broadly, at. Measure of America, we produce tools that make data easy to access and understand. On the, screen behind me you can see data to go New York City a free, online data, mapping, and visualization, tool combining, city state, and federal data. About. Half the indicators, available, on data to go come from the American Community Survey the. Annual. Survey conducted by the Census Bureau in between the decennial census, years we. Built dated ago three years ago and added, some additional datasets, as part of the opportunity, project two years ago for. This round we, wanted to explore how data to go specifically, and visualization. Of census data more broadly could, assist in the census outreach process, so. We partnered with the Asian American Federation, an umbrella organization of.
50 Community, groups in New York City that, has coordinated, a really robust, outreach, program, for the past two censuses, in. Conversations. With a number of these organizations. We talked a lot about drivers. About how to take people from, what matters to them to. Understanding. How, that is impacted, by the census and why they should fill out their census form, for. The most part these organizations. Have a good sense of what matters to their constituents, and a strong understanding of the importance, of the census but, what they needed more assistance with was that part in between with. Accessing, census data finding. Facts, to help people make those logical, bridges, and displaying. That data in fun and catchy ways. So. Funding. Is a very tangible way that the census affects people's everyday lives and, not only in terms of federal, programs that al Kait resources, according, to the census but, also in terms of individual, organizations, using, census, data to make the case for their work in grant applications you. Can see here two iterations, of a type of poster, that could be used to draw these connections. In a Senior Center in Flushing Queens a heavily, asian-american. Neighborhood they. Help illustrate that the center could better, advocate, for its programming, if it can show the neighborhood's high rate of people over the age of 65, this. Sort of messaging could be applied equally, well to any topic or organization. In, addition, to print materials, we've talked about other ways that having easy access to, census data is useful, to these organizations, for. Example identifying. Target, neighborhoods, and topics for public outreach like, bus shelter TV, and radio advertising. We're. Together, workshops, focused on the census using data to go for the leaders of these organizations and. Then, perhaps for youth groups and communities, more broadly. So. The, takeaway for me is that, at its root. Census. Outreach, work, is all about telling, stories about, why data matters, and in, the 2020, census community, organizations. That people already rely. On and, Trust are. The ones whose stories, are gonna matter the most so. We need to make sure that these organizations, are first. Actually. Able to access and use census, data but. Second, are sharing publicly, the ways that they're using that data and how it matters to their work we. Recently completed a project in which local organizations. Use data to go to tell, stories, about their communities, using, infographics videos. And reports we, put them all together on a website like you can see here which, in many cases serves, as a library, of how people, are using census, data and why it matters, something. Similar with a little bit more of an explicit census focus, could, be really helpful for people, and organizations, doing outreach work because, in the end the, goal is to really bring data out from behind the, scenes so, that people can have ownership over their own census, data to know what their responses, are used for and even to access the results themselves to, be able to look at what's going on in their, and advocate, for themselves, thank. You. Hi. I'm jonathan your xiaomi and i'm with IBM. Global business services federal consulting, practice, and. This is actually the first time we've had the honor of, participating. In the opportunity, project and, so. We're obviously very excited to, look, at the problem statement and at, first the problem statement is actually very straightforward. However. As we quickly learned, creating. A meaningful way to address, that challenge. Was. A much bigger hurdle, and so, what we did was we spent weeks. Of time. Conducting, interviews, and, and research, we. Actually instead of the one, or two weeks recommended, we spent about. Four or five weeks conducting. Research, in. Order to determine, sort, of which cohorts. Were the, most impacted, and how we could use our skills, and. Our tools to address, that challenge, in, a meaningful way and so. What we found over, those, couple weeks was that the. Individuals. Experiencing, homelessness were, actually most. In need of being counted. So. That they could receive funding. In. Their districts, and so that funding could get them the services that they needed, and. So for, example if you, look at LA County which is where we focused our efforts there's about, 58,000. Individuals, experiencing, homelessness in. LA County alone so, if, you take a look at the map you see, based, on the different colors, seventy-five. Percent of these individuals are actually living on the streets or in makeshift, shelters, or, in cars and things like that which. Makes it very challenging to, to reach these individuals. And. So as we began digging in we saw that this is also a large, challenge for the Census Bureau so the Census Bureau for 2020, the decennial census, plans. To employ. 43,000.
People To conduct this count and that's mainly, done, via. Pen, and paper, or operation, and. So, what, we did was. We. Engaged. A variety. Of different user advocates, so, the, National Coalition of homeless veterans the Los Angeles, homeless. Services authority and, most importantly, the US Census Bureau field, division and what, we did was we sat. Down and, we, had workshops with them and, conducted, interviews via, something, called a design thinking methodology which. Is this human. Centered, approach to innovation, that, you heard about at the beginning of the talk, and, what, came out of those interviews. Was, what. You see on the right over here it's actually called an empathy map, and, what that does is it. It, helps. Designers. Understand. What. Their user what their customer, segment, is doing. What, are they thinking what are they feeling what, are they saying, as they're, conducting, this homeless count for example, what, are others saying about it and so. It allows you to really design. Your solution, around, their. Needs and so, that's exactly what we did and so. We, used development, methodology, methodology called. Agile, which. Is an incremental. Development. Approach, that, basically, allows. Rapid. Response, you put out several, prototypes, you let people feel and touch the product and you take that feedback and you're able, to quickly and dynamically, modify, your tools that you meet their needs, and. Ultimately. What. We came up with is an. IOS. App called, pop count and so what this app does is it supports, the, logistics. The planning, the. Coordination. And. The data collection effort. That's undertaken, during the homeless count and so. What you have is you have a supervisor, that. Logs, in and they, can put in all the locations where they're going to conduct this count and. They can organize the logistics and assign it to the various field representatives. And. Then the field representatives, go out and they select the location, that they're assigned to they. Click survey pull up a survey and. They can complete, all that information, it eliminates a lot of the paperwork. Out of the almost, all of the transcription, process any, issues we have with tracking, survey. Responses. To. That particular, location, and. It also helps, when they're conducting the unsheltered count they can select the region on the map and that way a person, only focuses, on their region so whether they're going out and counting those individuals, who are unsheltered. And. Therefore, there's no double counting or anything like that so this. Is the tool that we've developed we're, hoping that in 2020, we can pilot this tool hopefully before 2020. With the LA County field office, also. Housing, and Urban Development does. An annual, homeless. Count which we're hoping to, help. Them with and so we are very excited to use. This tool and help address some, of the challenges with, conducting, the homeless count, thank. You. Hello, everybody good afternoon, my. Name is servant. Of Smith and I'm a researcher. Of Public, Interest AI projects, at MIT. Is probabilistic, computing. Project, and all, that's really just to say that we're looking at the same basic, problems, as the ones you've heard about all of, today. Ahead. Of the 2020. Census. Because, we, see two distinct challenges, and one is the general need to increase, the self-response, rate we know that this can result. In important savings for the federal government more.
Importantly, Or as important, is the. Need to address the disproportionate. Undercount, of certain, populations often. Referred to as hard to count populations, because, as we, all know census, data helps determine the allocation, of economic and, political resources. Now. Imagine. If we could address these, dual challenges, with something, as simple as a search engine. This. Is where Bayes DB, comes in what, we've developed at MIT and, that is basically. A search engine for public, data powered. By probabilistic. Artificial. Intelligence. By. Using this. Form, of software we're, able to address important. Questions, one. Is basically. What types of variables, predict. The. Response, rate this. Is important, to understand what, we're looking at now looking for more partners, looking for and the, second is where, should we be looking to, find out more about, what. Works so. Let's say we might be looking for counties, where we see an unusually, high response. Rate despite certain, demographic, characteristics such. As large. Presence of hard to count populations. So. Let me show you briefly what a, search. Engine for public data might look like. Basically. It's a plug. Into a spreadsheet such, as Google sheets and, what. You see running now in the background is the AI generating. Statistical. Models and with. That you, can query the data with just one click, as, I. Was, talking about earlier looking, for instance what berbils predicts, the, response rate this is often as, we see here age. Housing. Stability and, whether you rent or own your house and what. You can find this way is connections, that you might not otherwise find, because. We know regression, is often driven by certain theories, of change and it's, just one model the. Second as I referred to earlier is that we might be interested, in a certain example. Of other. County that. Is a place where we have a relatively, high response, rate but. Also a relatively, sort of sizable, hard, to count populations, such as college, students, and. Now the entire, spreadsheet, is basically sorted accordingly, and we can go in and look at those counties, where we're seeing this, particular phenomenon, that is of interest. And. So. In speaking with various. Potential, users, and we have sort of a broad net that we cast initially, but, for this particular challenge, mainly. Community, organizations, at the local level, we, found that base DB could help address a number of key bottlenecks, for them one. Is that it's accessible, as I just demonstrated anyone. Who understands a spreadsheet with, one click is able to find quite interesting, relationships. In the data. Secondly. It's it's cheap is cheaper than hiring a team of statisticians, you. Just need to pay we've estimated basically $2, per spreadsheet to run this and. It's. Important to note that it's open source so that sort of feeds into both of those points and then, again it's extremely, fast some. Of the data, journalists, we spoke to who are looking into questions, around the census would, spend as, much as six weeks trying to find the types of matching, pairs, that I was showing earlier and, then.
Finally. We. Can audit the AI because, it has to makes it assumptions, explicit, and. There's value in that if we want to go back and try to understand, some. More about this so. With, that thank, you. Hello. Everyone my name is Caleb Barton and I am the program, officer with True Colors Fund, based, out of New York City but we have office right here in DC and I'm, here, to talk to you about the issue of youth youth homelessness, now, typically I don't like to bring up the problem so much without offering solutions, but fortunately, my new peer my new colleague Jeff is going to come with his with, some information from Excel to offer solutions right after me. So. A bit, about you colors fun true colors fun is an organization, a nonprofit organization, non-government. Organization, that is dedicated to the eradication of, youth homelessness, we. Do this through our. Authentic. Approachable, optimistic. Collaborative, grounded, creativity, quirky, innovative, work all right so. A little, bit about youth homelessness so you Thomas in this country has become quite an issue to the degree where, it has received a lot of attention. In the past few, years even, so that the Department of Housing and Urban Development, decided. To release a 33, million dollar grant. 33. Million dollars grants, to ten different communities, across the nation all, focused, on finding best practices, and solutions in ending effectively, ending you Tomas's in those communities, so, True Colors Fund is working directly with these communities. To provide some technical assistance around what, are those best practices and what are those solutions and what we are found is the number one majority. Of the people majority. Of young people who are experiencing, homelessness identify. As LGBTQ, as a matter, of fact it's over overwhelmingly. Forty percent of youth. Experiencing, homelessness identify. As LGBTQ, those. Folks have. Experienced. Homelessness in a myriad of different ways and so, this probably speaks to some of the prior, presentations. In the sense that it may be that hard to reach or hidden populations, and. Some young people may not even know that they are experiencing, homelessness, essentially. That definition, has began to expand, in the sense that we, had to make sure that we also we. Also captured, folks who are couchsurfing. Or folks, who aren't necessarily chronically, homeless but, they weren't in a safe and secure environment nonetheless. So. With that being the case we, feel drew. Colors fun filled that we do have to approach the the issue in innovative, ways to be able to find those quote-unquote, hidden populations, identify, them and make sure that. They are placing us in a space that is safe and protecting, of themselves. So. What, is currently happening is, that we are looking, to we, are looking to expand, of the definition of homelessness and. What, the the Census Bureau can do in Excel can do to, benefit, that is through the technology, through this opportunity, project providing. This. Application, that young people can able be able to access believe. It or not but Millennials love technology. All, right so, Millennials, will be a will, be accessing, this because a lot of times young people who are experiencing, homelessness although. They may be disenfranchised. And may not have a lot of things they usually have. This somewhere near them they have a cell phone right and so they can actually access the applications. To be able to receive information about solutions. Or options for them in their communities, and also. They can be able to to, expand, their knowledge of exactly what homelessness looks like for them so. Without further ado I'm going to bring up Jeff, from Excel and he's going to tell you about their their project. Hi. Everybody um my name is Jeff suppes and I work at excel at consulting, and we are an IT, consulting, firm based out of Arlington, Virginia. And. We have a number of clients, in the public private and nonprofit sector. That we helped to bring. Different software, development, solutions, and, our. Problem. Statement that Caleb. Just talked about was we were given the task of creating a digital tool to, help youth who are experiencing, homelessness, now. Through the opportunity, project we are. Pretty familiar with, building. Digital solutions, at Excel however, the opportunity project helps to. Provide. Us different, ways to kind of work, with technology, so it introduced, us to working, with new problem statements such as working, with youth homelessness, and. Introduced, us to working with different local. Advocacy. Organizations. And different local and federal agencies, such as HUD and IDI and. So because, at Excel we're used to building solutions we're, used to doing human centered design but. We had to kind of do, it with a different approach just.
Because We were tackling a problem that we didn't have and. So, the first thing we did is we gathered, all of our different user advocates, so True Colors Fund and. Another number. Of other local. Organizations that, work with homeless youth and. We also gathered apartment education and HUD together all in a room to kind of understand what this problem was and what they what. They believed needed, to be done in order to help these homeless youth and how technology, can kind, of be a bridge for them so. After. We kind of got our ideas, or got, some ideas we were introduced, to this, sphere. Of youth homelessness we. Then we're able to work together with different. Homeless. Youth through the different organizations, we were working with we had some ideas out of that first initial brainstorming session, we. Made. A couple of different mock-ups and sketches and we then were able to work with different youth who are who were currently experiencing, homelessness to get their point of view to, understand what they're going through and not just. Here at secondhand, and this was a game changer for us because prior to this we had just heard about you, through experiencing, homelessness through, other people but this was the first time we were face-to-face with them we got to connect with them and they could put faces to the products that we were building so. After this we had a ton of information so we gathered around a lot of pizza and we just brainstormed we iterated we had a lot, of different ideas we had a lot of different solutions in mind and, we just started to iterate to work. Off of what we were doing and so, this, is a screenshot of just our first iteration it's, very basic we realized, that homeless. Or. You through experiencing homelessness there, are a lot of resources, that are available to them there are shelters there's food banks there's, Wi-Fi spots, but a lot of times a difficulty, kind of connecting to that so, our first iteration we took, all this information, from them and we, kind of created, just a very basic search, engine, where they could put in their location and it pops out different resources.
After. That we decided, to make it a little bit prettier add colors add pictures, and then we took them to the different youth that we've been talking to and we gave it to them and we thought we had solved the problem really cool this is everything this, is gonna solve every problem that you had but, as we, saw them interacting, with it they started. Thinking, those Airbnb. They asked that's cool how much does it pay to use this how much do we have to pay to, get in contact with the different hosts here and so we realized like okay we we, kind of need to go back to the drawing board we need to curl. Back go, back to Ground Zero take all this information and, start iterating and, start working. With different data sets and so, what we ended up with was, my, spot which is a website that, is. For. These, homeless youth, to connect. To the different resources that they have on that they can enter their location, they can see different services or agencies, or shelters, available to them and. Through, this process with the opportunity, project we learned a lot of amazing, things we learned the. Power of working with government, agencies and working with local advocacy, groups we learned, that, digital. Solutions can help change people's lives but really the most important thing we learned is that a, digital. Product that is built by and for the users is, the product that's going to be the most powerful thank. You. Thanks. So much so. We're, gonna take a five minute social. Media break we, want you to give, a shout out to hashtag, opportunity. Project stretch. Get up stretch your legs and just one note there's, a bunch of seats sort of in the middle we want to make sure that people can kind of access the seats at the end so when, you get back to your seats please kind of move towards the middle thank you. Hi, everyone, we. Are gonna get started again in just, a couple minutes so. If, everyone can please wrap. Up your conversations. Take a seat. Post. On social media, hashtag, opportunity. Project as, much, as possible. Okay, thank you everyone we, are gonna get started now with the, veterans, homelessness, and access to jobs problem. Statements, so I'll turn it over to Charlie from VA. Hi. I'm Charlie Selby I'm with the Department of Veterans Affairs I play a very small part in a big effort to end homelessness among, veterans in, United States back. In 2010 the. Federal government and the auspices, of the u.s. interagency Council. On homelessness wrote. A plan called opening. Doors the first-ever federal strategic plan to prevent and end homelessness. Since, that time we've. Been working and we work in partnership with communities. Is a very partnership, you're in an enterprise we work with our federal partners and other agencies, state. And local governments but most importantly we, try to help communities, find the right solution, that works for them so. Earlier you learned some things about how data, and data driven solutions, can help figure, out where resources, go. It's. Been a very effective process. Since. 2010. Fifty-seven. Communities, have achieved an effective, end to veteran homelessness including, three states and, over four hundred eighty thousand, veterans have, either been helped to find permanent housing or, have been prevented from falling into homelessness. So. One. Of the challenges, that you have earlier you heard about was was how your array your resources, the other challenge you have is the lived experience, of the veteran. Experiencing. Homelessness so, you've figured out where they are you figured out what the resources, are and how to get them to the right place now you've got the challenge of I'm a homeless veteran and I'm, trying to get the stuff there. Are all sorts of things that I need I need access, to housing I need access to jobs I need, access to services, and it's not easy being. A homeless individual, or someone who is at risk of homeless to, try to go out and figure out where all the stuff is. One. Of the very important, things too is access, to jobs I can't emphasize it enough there's. A common misperception, that the leading cause of homelessness, is related, to alcohol. And mental health and while many people who experience homelessness. Do, suffer from alcoholism and have mental issues the. Number one leading, indicator, of your risk of becoming homeless is poverty. And the. Cure for poverty is this thing called a job I once. Looked at data on. Women veterans who accessed, the VA for, any type of homeless service. 75%, of them were employed, of the, 75%, they were employed so they're demonstrably able to work, 66%, of them made less than a thousand dollars a month so. I would.
Like To say briefly thank you to my friend, David. Marin who said to us one day you should get involved the opportunity project they will help you find solutions as we, get near the end we, still have about 40,000, veterans that experience homeless at any given one time, it. Becomes increasingly difficult to find ways to link them to those services and so, data, and technology, are key, and without, David privately brought us to this opportunity we. Would not have had the opportunity to work with the really exciting tech solutions that you're gonna hear about next so. Thank you very much and we look forward to thank. You for us to be here. Hi, my, name's Michael Simpson and I'm the co-founder and CEO of parent and before I start I'd like to recognize, the team that helped. Create, the solution, we. Have Alejandro, Vasquez, in the back sebastian. Mackeson. Brendon. Keough and Mike. Drag alle so thanks, guys for all of your work on this project this. Is actually our second. Opportunity. Project. Our. First. One last year, was. Using. Department. Of Labor open skills API to. Allow. Military. Spouses. To, find, meaningful, jobs, and careers, that, match. Their proficiency levels, in soft, skills that we measure things like leadership, and, resiliency, things that are attractive, to employers and. Honestly, that could have just ended up in an. Interesting, prototype, if we had not met David Marin with the VA and Eddie. Minster with the Department of Defense who encouraged, us to take, it further. They. Also. Told. Us and helped. Us understand, more deeply the. Problems. That outgoing military, personnel, and veterans have, with. Transferring. Their. Understanding. Of the skills and experience that they have into. Private. Sector jobs and, that, is a major contributing, factor, to the, tens, of thousands, of. Homeless. Vets, that we have in the United States so. We are. Very, pleased to announce a parent pathways which is an actual product it's not a prototype and it. Is the very first career exploration, tool that, has. Value. For the, your, past as it. Helps. You map your future. We, use several. Different data sets in this system so the, very first thing is of course the, open. Skills API but we also use BLS, Anette, NCES. Department, of Treasury OMB, and. Other, private data sets as we map your career pathways, we, 100%, personalize. That base, on your. Individual. Soft. Skills proficiency, levels your, experience. Also, your. Personal, preferences, and interests. So. We help you see your, skills. And your strengths, and also your gaps and at the end of the process we. Help, you to have, a resume, and create one for you that can be optimized. To, make, it through the. Applicant. Tracking systems, and hiring, filters. Through. Our partner entry who is here today. We. Also point. Out to, you and introduce, you to different, types of degrees, and certificate programs we, even connect you directly to, those programs through.
The System, and we, connect you to our 300, online soft skills lessons, for. Allowing. You to improve. Your skills before you go to those jobs. We. Also point out interim jobs along the way we show you how ready you are for those jobs we show you the gaps to those jobs and we even go the extra mile, by, connecting, you directly to, employers. That have openings, for those positions through, connections. That we have with. Job. Boards popular job boards like zip recruiter. So. In the end we. Have, created. A system that. Not. Only, introduces. You to careers. But it actually makes those connections, directly, to, the. Individual. Programs. That will help you along that path as well, as the. Employers. That have those jobs and I have to say that what, began as a interesting. Prototype. Really. 18 months ago when we started our first opportunity project has turned into a real product. That has literally. Transformed our company, before. The end of this year in fact probably before the end of this month we will close, a deal with an estate, to, introduce this product to it we're talking two entities in three different countries. That. Actually use Oda net data in those other countries, to. Integrate, our system into their countries. We're, probably. Two days away from, a. Deal. With, a post-secondary, software, company that, will, introduce. Our product into 100, colleges and universities, within three years we're, talking to another organization, that has. The. Opportunity for us to connect to 12 million college, students directly and with, our partnership, with care partners plus we. Have the, opportunity, to serve up to 40 million, veterans. And their spouses so, I'd like to thank you for the, opportunity, for David. Marin. With the VA and drew, Zachary and the whole opportunity team, so thank you very much. Hi. I'm John Peterson, my. Title is leader catalysts for care partners Plus which means I poke, people with a stick to get him to do what they need to do but. Actually I'm the chief operating officer and in, the back here I've got the CEO Mike Manning we've, got our senior, vice president, Marty and manatee we've, got our vice president for materials. Diane, freed and I'd like to give a shout out to Dave Marin because he was instrumental in introducing us, to a, lot of different people in the process. My. Personal wrong button ah there we go okay. So. Our. Problem statement is is, broad and I'm gonna start off big and then neck it in smaller but. How. Do we measure, something. As big as the VA in terms, of success, what. Kind of metrics can we use the VA is a huge organization. With a lot of different. Sub. Organizations, benefits. It's. Got the biggest health organization, in the in America how do we measure success in that, kind of an organization. Well. The solution is, a secure. HIPAA. Web-based. Platform. That can access all, different, aspects, of the. Elements. That a veteran is able. To achieve so, if, you look at the gray circle here it connects a lot of different, organizations.
And. It, does that in real time and it, puts the veteran in the middle so, there's no more of the veteran going to this agency being told to go to that agency and back, and forth the. Veteran can get where he needs to go or she immediately. And, effectively. The. System also provides. Transparency. For the veterans so the veteran knows where. Their request is in the process and it, provides accountability, for the VA to. Know. Where. This pickups, are and take action. So. I understand, the pilot, is kind of a bad word in, the VA so we're, gonna have to come up with a new one but we conducted, a pilot and in. Washington DC Philadelphia. Camden. New Jersey and a location, in Bucks County Pennsylvania. And, we. Were focused on veterans. Suicide, but, we couldn't really address, suicide without addressing the, concomitant factors, of homelessness. And substance. Abuse so. If, you look on the right, side of this slide, we. Looked, at addiction we, were looking at homelessness. And how that affected. Suicides. We. Did the pilot we had 175. Veterans, come through we were told they were not going to answer any questions they, weren't going to give us the information we needed, and, we found that to be go and they weren't gonna be. Technologically. Savvy and, we found all of that to be untrue, the veterans were, very. Very. Forward with their information the. They, answered. 93 percent of the questions through, the surveys that we gave, them and we. Identified, 3,000, high, risk indicators. That if not acted upon would. Cause the veterans life quality. Of life to decline. So. We think there's a tremendous success the, one thing I do want to point out is. At. The bottom there. 12%. Of the population was, unknown, to the VA so. That's one. Out of eight veterans. That came through the door was, not registered with the VA didn't, the. VA didn't know anything about them and so those are the ones that are gonna fall through the cracks and this, our, system get vets help is designed. To prevent anyone, from falling, through the cracks, so. Instead, of calling on the phone and getting the the voicemail that says welcome to the. If you're having an emergency I mean. It took, me 46. Seconds, of listening to that before I got to if you want to make an appointment you can. Do it right here on your phone your. Phone your tablet or, any device, that connects to the Internet you get a home screen where you can select, what. You're looking for, it'll kind of channel you in and help you focus and then. As, soon as you hit Send you get a date/time, stamp that, says it's. Your request has been launched on this date and time it went to this person, not, this office not this agency, this, person, and if. You don't get an answer back in a certain, amount of time which is designated by the VA let's say two days if, you don't get an answer back in two days it gets elevated automatically. And that person's. Manager, gets a notice saying hey it's stuck, so, again, transparency, for the veteran accountability. For, the VA. It, also gives a history. So it, is a database where we can store a veteran's information, one, of the biggest problems that veterans face is okay show me your dd-214 and. If. They don't have it they don't get the services. This, makes it accessible to them. These. Are the screens that the managers would see manager, can pull a a data. Screen and see, how, their workers, are working and what. I want to cover in the next steps is very. Simple, really we want to build new functionality. We. Want to partner. With people here, and we, want to explore. Expanding. This as a shared service, throughout, the government thank. You very much. Good. Afternoon. I see. OMB. Thank. You for having us, census, thank you for having us this. Opportunity. Project, is, something that I personally have dreamed, of for 16, years. I'm Merrill, Oliver I'm the CEO, for, ISA, vez I'm, also, the former. Director. Of the Maryland governor's grants, office the. Former, deputy director of, the Office of Management and, Budget for, the, Commonwealth, of Puerto, Rico, in charge. Of federal funds and, a. Three-term president. Of the national grants management Association. So. I am fully, vested. And invested. In. Making. Federal, grants data, user-friendly. The. Bottom line is and. Here's. Here's the problem, statement it's several pages. The. Bottom line is we want to know and I'm going to put my. End-user. Hat. On here where's. The money we. Are still having difficulty. Even though grants.gov has, been around for a number of years. Accessing. Funds. That we are entitled, to and. Eligible. For that's. Our primary, focus, when. The governor's chief of staff, approaches. You and says hey find 1.3. Billion dollars to, help close our gap. That's. A challenge. We. Also want to know with. Strings attached, where. Do we go to get the information to, learn about how to manage these, dollars, and, then. We want to understand.
Are We getting our fair share. That's. Pretty much it, there. Are things like the data act out there we. Know that we want to have common, data elements. But. It all drives to that end point. We. Want to have access to, the dollars, we, want to understand, that these dollars are, having, a positive. Impact on our communities. And, we know that the federal government, has a lot of data to support our efforts in, ensuring. That these dollars are spent on, their, intended, purpose. And that, our communities, are benefiting. However. That data is spread all over the place, it has, taken. Me. And some of my teams weeks, to actually get at that data to, produce the kinds. Of reports, that the, opportunity, project, in partnership with the private sector these, tech firms are. Now able to produce at, the click of a button so. I'm not going to take any more of your time because what. You're about to see, with. The. Federal, funds portion. Of the, technology. Today is extremely. Exciting. State. And local governments, local. Municipalities. Nonprofit. Organizations. University. Sector this. Is all for, you so. Thank, you OMB. And census, for allowing us to partner with you to develop, these much-needed, tools. Good, afternoon my. Name is Rob Sherman I'm the product marketing manager for East Service and our, entry into the opportunity, project is Grant's intelligence, which today. Would really not be possible without the two wonderful people at our back table mr. Sammy Coto our vice president, of Technology and. Especially Nick, tiny our software, engineering manager. Here. We go try this one is this better I. Was. Told that would work, again. My Rob Sherman and product marketing manager for East Service. Entering. The opportunity, project is Grant's intelligence, which really wouldn't be possible without, Sammy. Hota our vice president, of technology and especially Nick Thani our software engineering manager who really, did an amazing job. We. Set, out to, create a truly transformative. Digital tool to help maximize grant. Funding, and you, might ask yourself, why. Grants, well. You. Know grants, fund, a significant, portion of government, activities, in the state local and tribal governments. And they. Really address some of the most pressing needs in our nation and that's something we care a lot about at E civis. So. We conducted a survey of thousands, of state local and tribal government. And we, we. Revealed a major roadblock. In a maximizing. Grant resources. It. Was a lack of awareness, and, training. So. Based on survey results, we developed, key areas, of our digital tool grants, intelligence, in fine, funding, we used CFDA and, USA spending data to. Identify funding. At the state level and in key categories. Because. Approximately. 80 percent of those federal funds go to the states but they get sub awarded, and this. Is where our sub recipients. Are going, to want to look since. Most local, government, private. Sector contractors. As well as nonprofit, recipients, simply. Aren't eligible to receive federal awards, in. The. Future here we want to add East civis data to create planning, tools such, as grant, calendars, and predictive, analytics. In. This, area states, and potential applicants, wanted to know, did. I go too far. Maybe. Sorry. About that I, think. I'm missing a slide. In. This. Area states and potential applicants, they wanted to know if they got their fair share of funding, and with, CFDA in USA spending data we built tools to explore spending, allocated, to each state across. The country and, also. To drill down into the largest, recipients. Of specific, program dollars because. We wanted to help. States understand, where, they are individuals, understand, where they fall within their state but also where, the states, compare, with other states and, in. The future we plan on expanding the, research lookups, to include per. Capita spending filters. We. Want to include County data which we just got access, to oops for some reason this keeps moving, on me. As, well. As funding. Trend charts and PDF reports. This. Keeps moving on me I got. One more in here somewhere. In. This area recipients. And sub-recipients, of federal dollars wanted to understand if they were good steward of federal funds I'm really. Excited about this part we built tools, with the single audit clearinghouse data, to help them understand their own performance, as well.
As How, their performance compares, with others and applicants. Should, really, position, this information. And future grant applications. To provide evidence of good stewardship, to a funder, or at. Least talk about how they put a audit, resolution program, in place to help reduce these findings. Because. This is what's gonna ultimately strengthen, their applications. In. The future we'd like to expand on the single, audit data to include, audit. Finding narratives and additional risk assessment, tools. As. Well as watch. Lists no palest DMV profiles, and we want to thank the opportunity project, for giving us the opportunity to. Give. Us access to this data but also the cohorts, at the OMB and Treasury, for. Working with us to pry, let, us provide feedback and make this really actionable we. Really wanted to make sure that we could maximize grant, funding in a truly transformative, way I hope. You'll come to our table and check it out for yourself thank you very much. Hi. My name is Ferran levy from true impact and. We're really excited to be here so thank you very much. So. Every. Year. Government, agencies, corporations. Foundations, individuals. Invest. Well, over a trillion, dollars in, more than 1.4. Million. Nonprofits. Across the country, to, address some of our country's most pressing. Problems, from. Education. To housing to, hunger, to health. But. The question is. What's. The social impact of all this funding, and and. Which of our investments. Have been the, most successful. The. Reality, is we don't really know and, that's. Because grantees, typically, will, quantify, the. Reach of their services, how many people, they're touchin
2017-12-04