When the Data Flowed to Indianapolis

Last week the National Neighborhood Indicators Partnership convening was held in Indiana. These events have been running twice a year since about 1996 and are a unique place for community development, social researchers, mappers, data scientists and planners to get together to share lessons with their peers. No vendors, no exhibitors, just data peeps and organizers.

There were about 100 folks in attendance, out of those, just seven were at the Indianapolis event ten years ago, but many attendees have been an active part of this network for some time. For me this feels almost like family, having been to more than I can remember, starting in 2006. It is one of the most honest events I participate in, where people are willing to share successes as well as failures, to be open about our organizational weaknesses and to encourage each other to do better.