Connecting People and Place: Improving Communities through Integrated Data Systems

Moderator: Kathryn Pettit, The Urban Institute 

Connecting People and Place: Improving Communities through Integrated Data Systems

Integrated data systems (IDS) are those that merge together data from various human service agencies on people at the individual level. An IDS can be used to improve case management for individuals, or analyzed to inform advocacy, policymaking, targeting, and program evaluation. This type of system might include data from social safety net programs, child welfare agencies, juvenile justice records, student enrollment and performance, Medicaid claims, and homeless information systems. An IDS allows one to study public policy in a more holistic manner and not from the perspective of an individual’s contact with only one agency.  With support from the Annie E. Casey Foundation, the National Neighborhood Indicators Partnership (NNIP) launched a cross-site project in six cities to bring policy research using IDS one step further, to connect IDS data to information about neighborhoods and place.

During this colloquy we will present early findings from our cross-site work and hear from two sites involved in the project. In Cleveland, our partner at Case Western Reserve University who built and operates an IDS for Cuyahoga County will work with the Ohio Longitudinal Data Archive at Ohio State University’s Ohio Education Research Center  to understand how child welfare and juvenile justice involvement affects high school graduation and college matriculation rates. In Pittsburgh, the NNIP Partner, Pittsburgh Neighborhood and Community Information System will work with the Allegheny County Department of Human Services to study how neighborhood characteristics affect absenteeism in public schools in three school districts.