Open Government Data

(3 Credit Hours) · Undergraduate

Open government data—simply put, government-related data freely made available to the public—is on the rise. Our federal, state, and local governments are developing and implementing open data policies and infrastructure in efforts to foster transparency, economic development, and wider civic engagement and participation. We will investigate the technical, legal, and ethical implications of open data (i.e., using open content to train harmful artificial intelligence technologies), acknowledging that personal privacy and civic society are closely intertwined. Class meetings are split between reading discussions and engagement with data science tools and data collection/harvesting methods. Students will inspect the major laws and policies surrounding open government while also examining the social and technological challenges and advancements that shape the future of open data—for example, grassroots data intermediaries are obtaining and "translating" open government data for a public audience. In the spirit of open scholarship, students will develop their own "open data projects" by incorporating open-source tools. No prior knowledge of computer science or data science tools (i.e., R, Python, etc.) is required.