2017 Grant Applicants

Listed below are the applicants to the Digital Impact Grants 2017 cycle who agreed to share details about their proposed projects with the Digital Impact community and public at large. Digital Impact will also share an interactive data visualization of these projects. Click here to view the list of applicants from the 2016 cycle. 

a2i and Innovations for Poverty Action
Research
Digitizing Government Services in Bangladesh: Impacts on efficiency, corruption and distribution
“The project will investigate the impact of digitization of government services in Bangladesh on efficiency and corruption with a focus on identifying how the reform affects different groups.”
New Haven, CT, USA

African Minds
Research
Open Data Intermediaries and Economic Ownership Rights
“A study of actors and data flows in a data ecosystem exploring the effects of open data intermediaries, particularly on the economic ownership rights of those who provide data.”
Cape Town, South Africa

Arab World Internet Institute
Sector Advancement
Digital Data Capacity Building for Civil Society in Tunisia
“Build the capacity of activists from Tunisian civil society on the principles of digital data.”
Vitry Sur Seine, France

Ariadne – European Funders for Social Change and Human Rights
Sector Advancement
Research and decision-making framework for philanthropic organizations sharing grants data for human rights and social change projects
“The project explores the decision-making process for philanthropic institutions as they collect and share open, comparable grants data, including current approaches, risks and emerging best practice.”
London, United Kingdom

Austin Independent School District
Sector Advancement
System Wide Information Sharing Hub (SWISH) Governance Planning
“In working to realize the vision of a region-wide data intermediary, the Central Texas community will develop a governance structure and charter reflecting input from all relevant stakeholders.”
Austin, TX, USA

BADIL Resource Center for Palestinian Residency and Refugee Rights
Sector Advancement
Open-source database for Palestinians who are forcibly displaced
“This project seeks to create a secure and ethical tool to compile and document instances of forcible transfer of Palestinians.”
Bethlehem, Palestine

Baltimore Corps
Sector Advancement
Evaluative Disparity Adjustment Tools
“The development of a framework and tools to detect and adjust for demographic disparities in performance across application criteria.”
Baltimore, MD, USA

Benetech
Sector Advancement
Gamified Digital Security Training
“Build a ‘gamified’ version of an online digital security training module, drawing on lessons learned from our earlier prototype of a digital security auditing and training system.”
Palo Alto, CA, USA

Bread for the City
Sector Advancement
Open Access Advocate
“Bread for the City, a founding partner of the District of Columbia Positive Accountable Community Transformation (DC PACT), will create an innovative, single-shared data system.” across agencies.
Washington, DC, USA

Build ME
Sector Advancement
Uganda Rural Digital Services Improvement (URDSI) Project
“The Uganda Rural Digital Services Improvement (URDSI) Project has been designed to address the challenges and bottlenecks in the ICT sector and support government efforts.”
Kampala, Uganda

The Busara Center for Behavioral Economics
Sector Advancement
Kenya Health Sector Research Registry
“Busara and several health players (government and other) will build an online central repository for health researchers and practitioners to share research, enhancing collaboration and open science.”
Nairobi, Kenya

Center for Disaster Philanthropy
Sector Advancement
State of Disaster Philanthropy
“CDP partners with Foundation Center to conduct ‘Measuring State of Disaster Philanthropy: Data to Drive Decisions,’ comprehensive data collection, mapping & analysis of disaster-related philanthropy.”
Washington, DC, USA

Centre for Budget and Governance Accountability, India
Sector Advancement
Developing an open source public database on state budgets to strengthen governance accountability in India
“A comprehensive public database on state budgets in India, ‘Budget Explorer,’ will be developed to enable users to search and explore disaggregated budget data across years in machine-readable formats.”
New Delhi, India

Centre for Global Equality
Sector Advancement
Open Teacher Education Data for SDG4’s Supporting Inclusive, Equitable, Quality Education in Sub-Saharan Africa
“Convene the teacher education sector around open data and open resources, ensuring effective, scalable, accountable teacher programmes in those areas of sub-Saharan Africa that need them most.”
Cambridge, United Kingdom

CIVICUS
Sector Advancement
Data for Action: Bringing Responsible and Secure Data Practices to Community Surveys
“We aim to improve our e-learning course on using data for action and evidence-based decision-making for civil society by developing and including a module for secure and responsible data practices.”
Johannesburg, South Africa

Clubul Ecologic Transilvania (CUI)
Sector Advancement
Improving digital literacy of nonprofits in Romania
“Develop freely shared course outlines and recorded video courses for nonprofits in order to increase the literacy concerning principles of ethical, safe, and effective digital data use.”
Cluj-Napoca, Romania

Community Health Councils
Sector Advancement
Healthy Kids Zones Data-Sharing Project
“Develop data-sharing community research protocols between multi-sector private and public agencies working on a place-based health policy initiative, to inform the creation of an open source platform.”
Los Angeles, CA, USA

Community Venture Partners, Inc.
Sector Advancement
The Marin Post
“The mission of the Marin Post is to empower citizen journalists by providing a self-publishing platform for articles about issues of shared community concern.”
Mill Valley, CA, USA

Coolab
Sector Advancement
Coolab Community Networks
“Coolab is a cooperative collective that finances and supports the creation of community networks for Internet access in Brazil through loans, training and community organizing.”
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Cooperative Development Institute
Sector Advancement
A Perpetual Census of Rooted Economy Organizations
“We want to build the machinery that we and others can use to build a perpetual, evergreen census of their constituencies; in our case, these are cooperatives and other rooted economy organizations.”
Northampton, MA, USA

Cornell University School of Industrial and Labor Relations
Research
Best Practices for Countering Bias in Automated Hiring Platforms
“We will research how bias is embedded in automated hiring platforms and the legal and technical means for countering it.”
Ithaca, New York, USA

Dance4Healing Inc.
Research
Impact of the Dance4Healing Telehealth Live Video Platform (TLVP) on Physical and Psychosocial Well Being of Cancer Patients and their Care-Partners
“A collaboration between Dance4Healing and Stanford Integrative Medicine to evaluate whether creative arts therapy can be provided remotely to help patients who are confined at home due to cancer. “
Sunnyvale, CA, USA

Data Orchard
Sector Advancement
Data Evolution
“We will develop and test a model of support, and an online self-assessment tool, for accelerating progress on the journey towards data maturity in non-profits.”
Hereford, United Kingdom

DataKind
Sector Advancement
Share and Learn: DataKind Labs Open Blueprint
“Sharing a guide to our newest program area with both the tech sector and civil society so others can replicate, repurpose and improve on our process for running a data science for social good project.”
New York, NY, USA

Democracy for Development
Sector Advancement
Indicators 4 Development
“Facilitate access of secondary data to independent researchers and universities in the region, and promote proactive submission of relevant data by those to further enlarge the dataset in the portal.”
Prishtine, Kosovo

Development Solutions International, National University of Mongolia, and the Agricultural University of Mongolia
Research
Research on community involvement in Mongolia’s mining development
“The study will conduct research on impacts of recent mining development on Mongolia’s herder communities livelihood and develop a model for enhancing community participation in decision making.”
Reston, VA, USA

Digital Empowerment Foundation
Sector Advancement
Responsible Community Data usage by CSOs (RCDC)
“Based on intensive research on data practice by India-based CSOs, this project will develop a tool to measure consent, privacy, openness and pluralism principles within Indian social service sector.”
New Delhi, India

DR Congo Open Data Initiative
Sector Advancement
To develop a visualization application for citizens to monitor revenue from extractive industries in DR Congo
“We develop a visualization tool that lets citizens in DR Congo monitor how revenues from extractive industries are spent, finally to enhance transparency and accountability in revenue management.”
Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo

Earth Innovation Institute
Sector Advancement
Produce-and-Protect: Connecting civil society organizations and producers with donors and investors to solve climate change, deforestation and social justice in the Amazon
“The on-line, digital, government-endorsed ‘Produce-and-Protect’ platform allows civil society groups to publicize their projects and financial needs for slowing Amazon deforestation.”
San Francisco, CA, USA

Emerson College – Engagement Lab
Research
The Big Civic IDEA: A Lifecycle Approach to Civic Media Literacies
“The Big Civic IDEA is a civic media learning framework that youth-focused nonprofits can use to employ digital tools for civic action taking.”
Boston, MA, USA

Food Banks Canada
Sector Advancement
Creating a centralized donor/prospect knowledge exchange system for Food Banks in Canada
“Understanding the current knowledge, practices, and philosophy of food banking organizations with regards to privacy is vital so we can create a centralized donor/prospect knowledge exchange system to help advance the sector.”
Mississauga, Canada

Fundación Futuro Latinoamericano
Sector Advancement
A Tamper-Proof Public Ledger of Crowdsourced Evaluations of SDGs: A Global Voice
“A crowdsourcing of evaluations of the UN’s SDGs from individual citizens – secured by a public blockchain distributed ledger – is proposed to inform policies in an efficient and timely manner.”
Quito, Ecuador

Fundación para la Prevención y Rehabilitación de la Drogadicción LIBÉRATE
Sector Advancement
Libérate Radio Stage II
“Libérate Radio is a social digital medium that serves as a communication channel between specialists in the treatment and prevention of addictions and patients or the community.”
Bogotá, Colombia

Funsidy Charitable Inc
Sector Advancement
Charievent
“Charievent is a free event ticket management platform that turns event organizers to volunteer connectors and fundraisers for their local charities nationwide.”
Royal Palm Beach, FL, USA

GINKS
Sector Advancement
Digital Empowerment and the Protection of the End User
“Lobby parliament to compel the digital protection commission to deliver on its mandate by the Data Protection Act, 2012 (Act 843) to protect the privacy of the individual and personal data.”
Accra, Ghana

GoodMap
Sector Advancement
A Common Framework for Community Benefit Information
“We will establish evidence-based guidelines for nonprofits to better utilize and contribute to open datasets in order to improve data-driven program development and implementation.”
Saint Louis, MO, USA

Health Care Without Harm
Sector Advancement
Leveraging Health Care for a More Sustainable World
“HCWH will develop data visualization features to allow its members from the global health sector to conduct comparative analysis and global benchmarking of environmental footprint reduction data.”
Reston, VA, USA

Hollaback!
Sector Advancement
Hollaback! Digital Literacy and Security Resources and Trainings to Address Online Harassment
“Hollaback! will build out digital literacy and security trainings, equipping organizations with the tools and infrastructure they need to effectively respond and remain secure from online harassment.”
Brooklyn, NY, USA

Impact Finance Center
Sector Advancement
Impact Investing Data: PRIs, MRIs, and Direct Investments
“Historical and comprehensive Impact Investing Data provided for free through a subscription based system designed to grow and continue to be updated with new investments.”
Denver, CO, USA

Improve International
Sector Advancement
Donor Scorecard: a way to encourage transparency and follow up in international development
“The donor scorecard is a way to encourage international donors to know, share, and respond to long-term results of their grants and adapt to invest wisely.”
Atlanta, GA, USA

India Centre for Internet and Society
Research
Evaluating Safety Buttons on Mobile Devices
“This is a study of mobile device-based safety buttons, and their impact on women’s physical safety, privacy, and data security.”
Bangalore, India

InterAction
Sector Advancement
Finding Practical Solutions to Help INGOs Publish Better Data
“We would like to find out what are the incentives, challenges, and practical needs for INGOs to publish high quality, timely data to existing standards, e.g. IATI, NGO Aid Map, Guidestar, etc.”
Washington, DC, USA

The Janus Foundation for Applied Social Research
Research
Nonprofits’ Engagement on Twitter: A Comparative Case Study between National and State Level Organizations
“We will use publicly available tweets to determine how nonprofits are using social media to engage or encourage their supporters.”
Mount Vernon, IL, USA

Learn All the Time Network
Sector Advancement
Strengthening Privacy and Security Practices in Youth Development Providers
“Improving digital privacy and security practices of youth development service providers with openly-licensed resources developed by national leaders in education technology and Internet health.”
Austin, TX, USA

Lensational
Research
Empowering Women through Mobile and Photography: Practical Toolkit for Learners, Educators and Activists
“Lensational is a charity that equips marginalized women in developing countries with digital skills and photography training, so they have a voice, a base of strength and a source of income.”
London, United Kingdom

MAKAIA
Sector Advancement
Creation of data culture in nonprofit organizations in Colombia
“This project will foster data culture, increase the levels of data maturity of Colombian non-profits and based on this, design a data-maturity model and guide adapted to the Latin American social sector.”
Medellin, Colombia

Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems
Research
Avoiding Discrimination in Automated Decision Making and Machine Learning
“We will provide an open source software solution to discover different types of discrimination in data and prevent discrimination in automated decision making as well as machine learning algorithms.”
Tübingen, Germany

Metropolitan Area Planning Council (MAPC)
Sector Advancement
Using Data for Non-Experts: Platform to Increase Data Literacy in Low Capacity Organizations
“Digital platform to access, explore and understand neighborhood-level demographic and economic information for use by low-capacity nonprofits and governments in community development and planning.”
Boston, MA, USA

Miami University
Research
An interactive public geospatial information-sharing portal for Hamilton, Ohio
“We will create an interactive public geospatial information-sharing portal in support of data-driven decision-making and public participation in community development in Hamilton, Ohio.”
Oxford, OH, USA

Minnesota Council of Nonprofits
Sector Advancement
GrantAdvisor.org
“GrantAdvisor.org is a new informational web service that encourages data-informed decision making among nonprofits and foundations. The site crowdsources grantmaker information from fundraisers.”
Saint Paul, MN, USA

NADEL, Chair for Development Economics, ETH Switzerland
Research
Increasing community-level transparency on the effects of resource extraction via mobile phone technology
“We introduce a mobile information technology in local mining communities to increase transparency on the effects of resource extraction and empower stakeholders to create positive development outcomes.”
Zurich, Switzerland

New America Foundation
Sector Advancement
Getting Public about Privacy: Community Support Networks for Data Privacy
“Resilient Communities proposes to build a pathway and resources for communities to build and customize their own data privacy frameworks through a public participatory process.”
New York, NY, USA

Northeastern University – Boston Area Research Initiative
Research
Translating Open Data into Public Value: Establishing a City-University-Community Review Committee for the Curation of Public Data Resources
“We will establish a cross-sector committee in Boston to guide the public release of research-quality data that can support efforts by community organizations and others to solve local issues.”
Boston, MA, USA

OCHIN, Inc.
Sector Advancement
Developing Standards for Connecting Healthcare and Community Based Organizations to Improve Population Health for the Underserved
“OCHIN will convene stakeholders to build a common framework for linking community resources with health information technology to address the social and environmental factors that impact health.”
Portland, OR, USA

Opportunity International
Sector Advancement
Unlocking the Potential of Social Data and Microfinance Institutions to Accelerate Solutions to Poverty
“This grant will test an easy-to-use social data analysis tool for microfinance institutions to improve decision-making and accelerate clients’ journeys out of poverty.”
Chicago, IL, USA

Oxford Brookes University
Research
Enhancing integrated performance management (IPM) systems for not-for-profit organizations: Understanding the barriers and how to address these
“An international workshop-based study to develop guidance for IT-enabled integrated performance management systems that help nonprofits create and account for multiple values for diverse stakeholders.”
Oxford, United Kingdom

Paradigm Initiative
Sector Advancement
A review of digital data management practices of government agencies in Nigeria
“This project aims to undertake a rigorous review of digital data management practices of government agencies in Nigeria and make recommendations for civil society through publication of its findings.”
Yaba Lagos, Nigeria

PEAK Grantmaking
Sector Advancement
Grantmaker Adoption of Data Building Blocks and Sharing Mechanisms
“PEAK Grantmaking will work toward field-wide adoption by grantmakers of the building blocks and mechanisms that facilitate data sharing.”
Washington, DC, USA

Police Foundation
Sector Advancement
Police Data Initiative (PDI) Visualization Project: Promoting Openness and Building Community “The PDI Visualization Project will provide technical guidance to police departments to create useful and engaging visualizations of open police data to promote understanding and build community.”
Washington, DC, USA

Grace Schultz, Portland State University
Research
Systematic Digital Collection and Analysis of Financial Data from Members Organizations of Zimbabwe’s National Association of Non-Governmental Organizations (NANGO)
“To set up a digital financial data collection system for Zimbabwe’s civil society organizations (CSOs).”
Hillsboro, OR, USA

Powered by Data – Tides Canada Initiatives
Sector Advancement
Data infrastructure and organizational autonomy
“Create and disseminate guidelines for data infrastructure that reinforces nonprofits’ autonomous ability to respond to the needs of beneficiaries, plus strategies to advocate for such infrastructure.”
Montreal, Canada

Pro Bono Net
Sector Advancement
Legal Empowerment Data Literacy and Governance Initiative
“Pro Bono Net will strengthen data rights and privacy for low-income individuals seeking legal help online and develop a data governance model for groundbreaking online legal referral collaboration.”
New York, NY, USA

Rang De
Sector Advancement
Swabhimaan
“An initiative seeking to provide adaptive financial literacy and requisite skills to make informed financial choices making it possible for individuals to apply for & receive low-cost loans.”
Bengaluru, India

Remix: The Soul of Innovation
Sector Advancement
Leading Impact Indicator
“This proposal executes on research by prototyping deployment of systems that produce leading indicators of impact and cost by advancing effectiveness and “datafication” of community engagement.”
Atlanta, GA, USA

Royal Dutch Kentalis (Kentalis International Foundation)
Sector Advancement
Open Visual Education Resource (OVER) for Deaf and Hard of Hearing Learners in Tanzania
“The project will develop, professionalize and disseminate an open access visual teaching resource which will help teachers and their deaf/hard of hearing students in Secondary Education in Tanzania.”
Sint-Michielsgestel, Netherlands

Sector3Insights
Sector Advancement
Digital and Online Giving Study
“The study will survey a representative sample of Americans to benchmark behaviors and attitudes, comparing methods of giving, specifically online and digital technologies and their impact on giving.”
Montreal, Canada

Social Good Brasil
Sector Advancement
Social Good Brazil/SGB Data-Driven Program
“SGB will serve as an advocate of the ‘Data for Good’ cause in Brazil, by training, spreading global knowledge, and empowering the country’s social sector regarding data for social impact.”
Florianopolis, Brazil

Sorenson Impact Center at the University of Utah
Sector Advancement
The Automatic Analyst Partial Test Pilot
“We will create a toolkit for automatically analyzing and visualizing common datasets in a way that is understandable to leaders in the social sector.
Salt Lake City, UT, USA

SOS Children’s Villages Kenya
Sector Advancement
Leading with Data
“The SOS Leading with data project is going to pioneer the use of quality data to enhance the project impact by availing useful insights on the project beneficiaries.”
Nairobi, Kenya

Startup Policy Lab
Sector Advancement
Transparency Database Project
“The Transparency Database will collect, standardize, and analyze data provided by companies to inform data-driven discourse on the expanding nature of government data requests.”
San Francisco, CA, USA

Stiftelsen iGov.Direct
Research
Digital Democracy
“The non-profit iGov.Direct foundation’s goal is, with the help of researchers and specialists, to build an auditable system for digital democracy.
Nacka, Sweden

Sustainable Neighbors Network
Sector Advancement
CODIP (The Communes Digital Impact Project)
“The CODIP is in a government approved CISCO Systems & training center, designed to provide high level training to Senegalese youths in creating government IT infrastructure.”
Irvine, CA, USA

Swasti
Sector Advancement
Enhancement of a community engagement android application and web platform to be used by field workers
“An android application to be used by field workers, which while enabling data collection and interaction on the field, also helps the FW prioritize and plan with the necessary data and information.”
Bengaluru, India

Swasti Health Resource Centre
Sector Advancement
WaSH facilities in healthcare institutions
“Sustaining Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WaSH) practices in healthcare facilities to prevent diseases through a real time monitoring system and behaviour change components.”
Bengaluru, India

Symbiosis Institute of International Business, Hinjawadi, Pune
Research
Development of User Friendly Mobile App for Digital Marketing of Agricultural Produce by Farmers
“Development of user friendly mobile app, which can be used by farmers to sale their farm produce directly to the consumers.”
Pune, India

Team 1708 Amp’d Robotics
Sector Advancement
T-Shirt Cannon Robot
“We are looking to build a robot with an 8 barrel Gatling style t-shirt shooter with two scuba tanks and tank treads for terrain.”
Pittsburgh, PA, USA

TEARS Foundation
Sector Advancement
Medi-App
“Enabling clinicians to track and record suspected abuse of children under 12 who are taken to multiple facilities to intentionally avoid detection.”
Johannesburg, South Africa

Thohoyandou Victim Empowerment Trust
Sector Advancement
Client Relationship Management (CRM) – Victim Empowerment Programme
“With over 22,000 victims in the last 10 years, TVEP requires leading edge technology to ensure victim abuse records are comprehensive, accurate and accessible.”
Thohoyandou, South Africa

Transporte Ativo
Sector Advancement
An integrated platform for bicycle usage data
“The project will gather data of bicycle use in Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo on an open platform that will enable cyclist elsewhere to replicate the work in their local realities.”
São Paulo, Brazil

Un Kilo de Ayuda A.C.
Research
Health education advocacy through virtual reality (VR) technology to eradicate violence against women in rural Mexico
“Through a virtual reality (VR) health education tool, we seek to eliminate cultural norms of violence against women and children under 5 years of age in rural communities in the State of Mexico.”
Mexico City, Mexico

United Way of the Quad Cities Area
Sector Advancement
Quad Cities Data Warehouse
“Our project will create the software structure of a data warehouse model, designed to allow communities to link program data with individual-level student data without violating FERPA.”
Bettendorf, IA, USA

Universidad Gabriela Mistral
Research
Women Report
“A platform to identify and monitor gender-based violence in real time.”
Santiago, Chile

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Research
A community-based crowdfunding platform for local teachers
“Our team is developing a community-based crowdfunding platform with an improved donation distributing algorithm to help teachers raise funding for creative teaching projects from local communities.”
Urbana, IL, USA

University of MIami
Research
From Slacktivism to Real World Activism: Engaging Millennials in Social Causes
“This study investigates what is it about some social media messages that motivates people from ‘slacktivism’ to real world action.”
Weston, FL, USA

University of Michigan
Research
Identifying Markers of Success and Failure from NonProfit Text Data
“This project will perform text analysis to identify linguistic signals for nonprofit success and failure from community-sourced stories about nonprofits available online.”
Ann Arbor, MI, USA

University of Pittsburgh Center for Social and Urban Research
Research
A Data Management Planning Toolkit for the Civic Sector
“We will improve local government and nonprofits’ capacity for data management and sharing by recontextualizing successful data management resources from the academic sector for civic organizations.”
Pittsburgh, PA, USA

University of Utah
Research
Measuring the New “Wired” Nonprofit: Who’s Giving Online and Why?
“This study examines factors that facilitate individual giving to nonprofit organizations on social media.”
Midvale, UT, USA

Veterans On the Rise
Sector Advancement
Aftercare enhancement to help veterans live lives in balance
“We will add a digital data security component existing life skills that are currently offered to veterans via our Veterans On the Rise After Care program.”
Washington, DC, USA

Vietnet Information Technology and Communication Center
Sector Advancement
Information Safety and Security Hub
“Information Safety and Security Hub (ISS Hub) is designed to take advantage of these opportunities and meet these challenges to ensure a secure and confidential information environment for everyone.”
Ha Noi, Vietnam

WayFi
Sector Advancement
WayFi na Maré
“Minimize digital exclusion by giving free wifi access to low income communities.”
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Wayne State University School of Social Work
Research
Mapping the Social Enterprise Ecosystem in Metro Detroit
“This project aims to define, understand, map and analyze metro Detroit’s social enterprise ecosystem. Study findings can help maximize the social impact of this sector by strengthening relationships.”
Detroit, MI, USA

Wheelchair World
Sector Advancement
Umbrella map and translator tool for wheelchair user reviews
“An umbrella map that signposts to wheelchair accessibility review sites across the globe, with the facility to set a profile language and automatically translate content to your chosen language.”
London, United Kingdom

Whittier College Institute for Culturally and Linguistically Responsive Teaching
Research
Ensuring data-driven accuracy in schools: improving how administrators interpret data and make decisions to effectively educate English language learner students
“Evaluating how digital assessment tools for English learners are used by administrators and how they can be improved so instructional decisions are based on accurate information.”
Whittier, CA, USA