Open Data and Innovation at the National Day of Civic Hacking 2016

Saturday, June 4 is the fourth annual National Day of Civic Hacking (#hackforchange), a nationwide day of action when people with a passion for community come together to code for change.  You don’t have to be a techie to participate – you’ll find everyone from community advocates to artists to educators to government officials at events taking place across the country. Any local resident who cares about her community can join. We’re so excited about these collaborations, because when citizens and government work together, communities benefit. That means things like technological advances in their food options, environmental quality, and criminal justice system.

What happens on the National Day of Civic Hacking?  The National Day of Civic Hacking is a collaborative effort led by the U.S. Small Business Administration, Code for America, and SecondMuse. On June 4, more than 100 events will take place across the United States, each with a unique mission. This year, teams will work together to think creatively and use open data to tackle challenges like:

• The Opportunity Project: Connecting people to social services, summer jobs, and neighborhood-level resources
• Data Visualization for Obama Administration's Promise Zones
• U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs Center for Innovation: Lyme Innovation
• U.S. Agency for International Development: Combating Zika and Future Threats
• Department of Energy and U.S. Department of Agriculture: The Water-Energy-Food Nexus
• And many others that your communities choose to take on.

There are opportunities to participate in events in both English and Spanish, and there might be an event near you!  

Building on the Administration’s Open Data successes

The National Day of Civic Hacking builds on the Administration’s efforts to engage the public in using data to solve problems. Civic technologists can draw on data from Federal, state, and local sources to co-create solutions geared toward expanding opportunity for all, including the nearly 200,000 datasets that are freely available on Data.gov, thanks to the Administration’s efforts to open up government data. 

We’re proud to see collaborative civic engagement taking place nationwide on June 4th, because we know that the best solutions emerge when we combine our knowledge, talents, and creativity. As President Obama said at SXSW, we need technologists working with non-profits, community groups, and governments to help solve some of the biggest challenges facing our country. Citizens working to advance innovation in Promise Zones, or mapping assets in their communities as part of the Opportunity Project, are a critical part of helping people across the country thrive.

“If we can reconceive of our government so that the interactions and the interplay between private sector, nonprofits, and government are opened up, and we use technology, data, social media in order to join forces around problems, then there’s no problem that we face in this country that is not soluble.  And the key is to have incredible talent, as is gathered here, to focus on it.” —President Obama at SXSW, March 11, 2016

We hope you get involved – whether on the National Day of Civic Hacking or any other time — it’s a great way to learn something new and help solve some of the biggest challenges facing our nation. With everyone working together, the possibilities are limitless.

And remember, share your ideas for National Day of Civic Hacking with the hashtag #hackforchange!

Kristen Honey is a Policy Advisor at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy