Volunteer data scientists help charities learn the value of Big Data

A group of charities including Oxfam GB and HelpAge International have been shown the value of big data by more than 80 volunteer data scientists at an inaugural event in London.

The first ever DataDive, held by the not-for-profit organisation DataKind UK, took place between Friday, 26th July and Sunday, 28th July at the offices of Mozilla in Covent Garden. Among the other attendees were Community and Voluntary Action Tameside and Hampshire County Council’s Special Educational Needs team.

Each charity at the DataDive, sponsored by Teradata, chose a specific project to focus on and was shown how to look at their data in order to solve specific issues, from studying the trends and underlying drivers that affect local food prices, to understanding age-related impacts on health and wellbeing.

· Hampshire County Council’s Special Educational Needs department aimed to predict where special needs education would be required in the future.
· HelpAge International began a project to understand age-related impacts on health and wellbeing.
· Community and Voluntary Action Tameside wanted to look at volunteer organisations in Tameside and how they compare based on activities, financial performance and needs.
· Oxfam GB wished to undertake a global study into trends and underlying drivers that affect local food prices.

At the end of the event Simone Lombardini, research officer at Oxfam, said: “I am amazed at how much has been done. We can use this output on a daily basis and we have so many more ideas for further research.”

Ben Gilchrist, from Community and Voluntary Action Tameside, added: “It has been a powerful experience that has moved us much further forward, and has created something really interactive.”

Beginning on Friday night, each of the four charities gave an overview of their project, with many volunteers working a 12-hour day on Saturday trawling through and analysing data, before re-convening on Sunday for more analysis. Each team then presented their findings.

The groups took on a ‘discovery’ approach, working on multiple streams and testing theories as they went with a series of experiments to test a hypothesis – disregarding those that were wrong or unsupported.

All the organisations involved were overwhelmed at how much they had achieved in a short space of time. Among the common themes was supplementing each charity’s data with third-party, publically available data, helping to add a richness to the data sets and enhance the findings.
The charities have said they will continue with their projects and many of the data scientists have agreed to stay on as dedicated volunteers.
Duncan Ross, a director of DataKind UK, said: ”This DataDive is just the start of the journey and is only really scratching the surface of what each of these four organisations can accomplish. What we hope to achieve is a revolution of the way that society uses data, ultimately to make the world a better place.”

The event, sponsored by Teradata, is the first DataKind UK DataDive, with more planned as the organisation grows and seeks charitable status.