UNSSC & Data-Pop Alliance course on Leveraging Big Data for Sustainable Development

We are pleased to inform you about the next edition of the UNSSC and Data-Pop Alliance training programme, Leveraging Big Data for Sustainable Development, which will be held at the MIT Media Lab, Cambridge, USA from 15 – 17 October 2018.

The course aims to help practitioners and policy-makers develop and implement Big Data innovation projects, policies, and partnerships in support of sustainable development objectives. Through a blend of teaching formats, including traditional instructor-led teaching, keynote speakers, and interactive and hands-on technical sessions, participants will learn the foundations of Big Data in the context of sustainable development and explore how to engage with Big Data in their daily work and life.

The broader and longer term objective is incentivising and enabling participants to contribute to a people-centered Big Data revolution – i.e. shape and leverage emerging Big Data ecosystem in ways that reflect and foster social progress and citizen empowerment across the globe, especially those of poor and vulnerable segments of societies. The three days of the course will focus on:

• Day 1: Contexts and Concepts: Understanding the foundations of the Big Data for development ecosystem.
• Day 2: Methods and Tools: Identifying Big Data methods and tools to translate sustainable development challenges to specific data questions.
• Day 3: Design and Strategy: Operationalising Big Data partnerships and policies by engaging stakeholders and communities through ethical practices and effective storytelling.

Upon successful completion of this course, participants will have:

• Heightened awareness of and interest in the main applications and implications of the most recent debates and advances in Big Data and sustainable development;