Monktoberfest Series - Little Tech, Big Impact aka Putting Tech to Work for Your Community

presented by Michael Ducy in October 2013

transcribed by Bill Cushard

When it comes to getting involved in one’s community, there are many choices. In fact, there are so many choices that it can cause some people to ask, “Where would I even start?” Of course, one can start by following a passion. On the other hand, some people stumble into community involvement by accident or with the help of an involved spouse, as was the case for Michael Ducy.

His wife asked him to get involved in a school board boundary realignment project and use some of that technology stuff that he does every day. At Monktoberfest 2013, Ducy tells the story of how he used a little technology to make a big impact in his community.

Little Tech. Big Impact.

You can imagine how realigning school boundaries can get people riled up because of the impact this can have on their children. People get really passionate about it. And this was one of the first things Ducy noticed during his involvement...that people get very passionate about something, but don’t do much to solve the problem. In other words, people were happy to share their opinion, but not possible solutions.

Perhaps because they did not have the tools necessary to propose solutions. This is what Ducy brought to the table. He tried to help solve the problem using a spreadsheet and Google Maps to rapidly and dynamically create boundary scenarios. These scenarios could instantly create a new school boundary on a map so everyone could see how their proposal would turn out.

Up until then, all of this data was stored in tables in PDF files. One passionate parent was manually drawing boundaries in maps to create scenarios. Innovative, yes. But with Ducy’s use of simple technology, he was able to produce scenarios like this on-the-fly. He presented his tool to the board, and this is where the big impact began. Ducy had three successes.

First Success: After presenting his scenarios to the school board, the board took one of his scenarios verbatim. That was a big win.

Second Success: The board was so impressed, it invited Ducy to join the committee to run scenarios to show the board results of their decisions. In effect, they created a lean school board committee, which took rapid experimentation of the data to look at results of realignment. People would suggest something, and the spreadsheet and map was able to show why an idea would work or not work. In real time. Another huge win.

Third Success: School board alignment was delayed. As a result of the scenario experimentation tool that Ducy built, the school board was able to listen to the community, use data, and make a decision to delay action until more scenarios could be thought through.

Smart.

Ideas for the Future

Another result of Ducy’s involvement was a short list of ideas for the future that could be implemented to improve decision making in the school district even further. Here are some of those ideas.

• Create site/app that allows anyone to create scenarios

• Solve for the “optimal scenarios”

• Leverage open source/real GIS systems

• How can this be applied to other problems?

Using Data to Make Objective Decisions

This is such a compelling, simple story of how a little technology can make such a big impact, and how easy it can be to create a tool using data to make decisions. Sure, the use of technology in this case was the simple part, but going up against a bureaucracy and a passionate, opinionated community is quite another.

However, data can be a means for getting beyond emotions to a place where objective decisions are more possible. At least by using data, people can better understand the trade-offs that have to be made.

Share Your Story

Has "little tech" had an impact in your community? We'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments below!