“It all comes back to good governance”: A walk through AISP’s 2024 convening
Governance is the foundation of all strong data sharing efforts — it determines the rules of the sandbox, ensuring there is a shared mission and vision to guide the people entrusted to steward these vital resources. Members of the AISP Network continue to demonstrate how governance builds the trust and relationships necessary to sustain data sharing efforts for the long term. More and more, these efforts are also recognizing the need to bring people represented in the data into decision making early-on to achieve lasting and equitable impact. The June 2024 AISP convening — a four-day gathering in Philadelphia bringing together AISP’s network, partners, and broader community — highlighted how the field of data sharing is growing and how data collaborations are adapting to ensure more just systems for all.
AISP hosts an in-person convening every two years, designing content for the meeting around members’ interests — what we’ve learned and achieved the last 2 years, what questions keep bubbling up, and what new challenges we’re facing. The AISP Network includes more than 40 data sharing efforts from across the U.S., housed within government agencies, executive offices, universities, and nonprofits. Ranging in age from 50 + years in the field to under a year old, these efforts bring a variety of perspectives into the conversation. Our Network meetings highlight and harness the brilliance of this peer community by offering presentations, discussion-oriented panels, breakout sessions, and unstructured social events that foster knowledge sharing and connection. Below we recap our June 2024 convening to explore what some of this looks like in action. For a full list of the events and presenters, see our online program for the Network Meeting and Data + Equity Summit.
Day 1. We started the week with a quarterly meeting of our National Advisory Committee (NAC). This group of highly experienced Network members and partners was formed in 2022 to support AISP’s strategic planning and prioritize how to best serve our Network and the broader field of public sector data sharing and integration. This in-person session focused on the evolution of our training & technical assistance program to support established sites, as well as on the federal landscape and related challenges and opportunities that are emerging for state and local efforts. See the full list of participants here.
Day 2. In the morning, we hosted two concurrent small group meetings: our Legal Advisory Workgroup (LAW) and inaugural Research Exchange meeting. The Network Meeting kicked off in the afternoon.
LAW discussed how to achieve the group’s long-term vision for building a pipeline of IDS-savvy and diverse lawyers to support the field. The Research Exchange highlighted rapid fire presentations of applied research from across the Network and included a discussion about possibilities for multisite research projects. Learn more about both groups here.
After kicking off the Network meeting with some games and get-to-know-yous, afternoon panels showcased how members of the Network are leveraging integrated data to improve the lives of the people they serve — including, families with young children (and the early childhood workforce who cares from them), people experiencing homelessness, and youth and young adults in moments of transition.
Day 3. Our Network Meeting continued the following morning with panels organized around the AISP Quality Framework. While each data sharing effort is different, the framework highlights five key components that set successful efforts apart. Each panel was designed to dig deeper into how different teams approach their core activities.
Explore some of our key takeaways in the graphic illustrations by Chrissie Bonner from Illustrating Progress.
This illustration captures Cross-agency governance: Process examples from the field, featuring:
- Katie Breslin, CT Office of Policy and Management
- Sydney Idzikowski, Charlotte Regional Data Trust
- Heather Rouse, Iowa State University, I2D2
- Della Jenkins, AISP, moderator
This session explored how cross-agency governance structures have evolved over time to include new members, build buy-in, and streamline decision-making. Katie Breslin explained how Connecticut’s P20 WIN system has expanded to integrate data beyond education and workforce with a collaborative learning agenda. Sydney Idzikowski shared Charlotte-Mecklenburg County’s new process for partner onboarding and early implementation of a standard review cycle for project approvals. Heather Rouse described how Iowa’s two-tiered approach to governance clarifies decision-making roles for the data system overall, as well as who is needed to advise on specific projects. Each demonstrated how cross-agency governance is evolving to ensure community members have a seat at the table.
This illustration captures Legal updates from the field, featuring:
- Paul Hogle, North Carolina DHHS
- Paul Stiles, University of South Florida
- Deja Kemp, AISP
Deja Kemp began this plenary session with an introduction to AISP’s growing portfolio of legal learning opportunities and invited feedback from participants to help guide future offerings. Next, our two presenters provided important updates on the national legal landscape, including federal regulatory changes that may impact data sharing and use — specifically, major changes to 42 CFR Part 2’s new rule and updates on NIST’s landmark Cybersecurity Framework. You might not expect it from the content, but it was a laugh-out-loud session.
This illustration captures our panel on Race, ethnicity, language, and disability (RELD) data standards, featuring:
- Meeta Anand, The Leadership Conference Education Fund
- Sujata Joshi, Northwest Portland Area Indian Health Board
- Kim Paull, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Rhode Island
- Sumit Sajnani, CT Office of Health Strategy
- Sharon Zanti, Iowa State University, moderator
Sharon Zanti began the session with an overview of how she and her fellow panelists are collaborating to update AISP’s 2020 Toolkit on Centering Racial Equity to address gaps in guidance on race, ethnicity, language, and disability (RELD) data. The panelists, who are all members of the Toolkit 2.0 Workgroup and RELD Subcommittee, then reflected on and discussed their experiences working with RELD data, providing real-world examples of how they’ve approached challenges to thoughtfully collecting and using these data.
This illustration captures IDS HR: Onboarding, culture building, & data literacy, featuring:
- Josh Martin, Indiana Management Performance Hub
- Maira Rosas-Lee, Minnesota SLEDS
- Carl Frederick & Krista Bryz-Gornia, IRP, Wisconsin Administrative Data Core
- Amy Hawn Nelson, AISP, moderator
This session looked at common staffing and sustainability challenges among integrated data efforts, and how to be nimble in response. Krista Bryz-Gornia and Carl Frederick shared how they are adapting to new tech and team needs and sustaining buy-in from data partners to maintain their long-running university public partnership, even as key personnel retire. Maira Rosas-Lee discussed how her state SLDS team supports regional data coaches to foster data use and feedback loops, and highlighted the need for better data cataloging and documentation. Josh Martin shared lessons from his tenure building a statewide data literacy program in Indiana, and detailed his engagement with federal partners around new guidance on the use of evaluation funds to support state IDS. Panelists all shared practical methods for deepening a culture of collaborative data use in government, including a strong commitment to documenting processes to help staff level up as both problems and solutions evolve.
This illustration captures our closing celebration of Network progress & achievements and the presentation of the 2024 Pete Bailey Award. This session featured high-impact projects and partnerships across our Network including the Charlotte Regional Data Trust’s support for the Charlotte Quality of Life Explorer, the Massachusetts Public Health Data Warehouse’s research on the opioid epidemic, and Hartford Data Collaborative’s work with on equitable pandemic recovery among young children. We were also joined by Dave Patterson from South Carolina, who was presented with the 2024 Pete Bailey Award for his years of service and mentorship. Learn more about Dave’s impact here and check out our full Network Meeting program and photo gallery here.
Day 4. Our final day was the first-ever Data + Equity Summit — a gathering of practitioners from across the country working at this important intersection. The event was open to the public and led by our Equity Fellows and members of the Equity in Practice Learning Community (EiPLC). Participants included AISP Network members who extended their stay to join, as well as new faces from federal agencies, academic institutions, local agencies and nonprofits, and community foundations.
The event began with a keynote from Tawana Petty, a mother, social justice organizer, poet, author, and facilitator. Her talk explored the narratives we learn about race and place from powerful voices in media and politics, reinforced by racist data practices and algorithms, and called for an unlearning through seeking out new narratives driven by marginalized populations and their storytellers. Petty brought her love of Detroit, community spacemaking, and spoken word into the room.
Following Tawana’s speech, Blu Lewis — Organizing Director of NC BLOC and an AISP Equity Fellow — led the group through a deep dive on the implementation of AISP’s Toolkit on Centering Racial Equity. They challenged participants to consider what power they hold, what power they might be leaving on the table, and where other sources of power can be leveraged for change in their context.
We kicked off the afternoon with a panel featuring members of the EiPLC who shared how they’re testing new models of community engagement to share power through data governance.
To close out the day, we explored approaches to engagement and challenged our own routines and assumptions through interactive workshops. A range of topics were offered to meet the interests of participants from different contexts and roles; these topics included participatory activities to build trust and level power in community, using process maps to shift towards more participatory data governance, community participation in qualitative research, and strategies for inclusive data collection and analysis. Participants left with new tools and approaches to test in their context.
Videos of panel and keynote content will be shared in late August 2024 on AISP’s website.
The convening would not have been possible without a group of peers committed to exploring diverse models for impact. As we grow, we are excited to continue to push ourselves toward deeper community engagement and to centering equity in the approaches we nurture. Thank you to the members and partners who joined us, in person and in spirit, and who guide our work every day.
Be sure to share this post with anyone who would benefit. If you or someone you know is interested in joining the AISP Network or participating in our Research Exchange, get in touch! And subscribe to our newsletter to get the latest from our Network members and updates on the field of ethical data sharing.
Graphic illustration by Illustrating Progress.
Photos by Greg Benson.
