2025-10-21 –, UVM Alumni House Silver Pavilon
This session explores early design and back-end development of the Vermont Data Collaborative, an open source data dashboard for the state. Participants will engage in a collaborative discussion on incorporating feedback from community partners, with an emphasis on design considerations, data access, prototyping with the final project in mind, potential pitfalls. The aim is to both provide a practical framework for your open source data project, and improve that framework itself.
The Leahy Institute at UVM is building an open source data dashboard to make state-level information more accessible and actionable. This session takes a closer look at the early stages of the platform’s development, including backend design, data management, and transitions from initial ideas to prototypes to design documents to final versions. Participants will collaborate on how to integrate feedback from community partners, exploring ways to ensure the platform meets real-world needs. The discussion will cover practical considerations for data access, visualization strategies, prototyping with the end product in mind, and common challenges in building open source tools. Attendees will leave with concrete approaches for applying these lessons to their own projects, while also contributing to the refinement of the Vermont Data Collaborative framework.
I am a graduate student in Complex Systems and Data Science at the University of Vermont. My academic interests range from representation patterns in neural networks to open source data access.