GobLab UAI starts “Data Science for Public Managers” course

What kind of public problems to solve with data? What are the minimum requirements of a data science project? These are some of the questions that are being sought in the course “Data Science for Public Managers. How do we formulate data projects that solve strategic problems?”, carried out by the public innovation laboratory, GobLab UAI.

The program, aimed at public managers in Santiago and Valparaíso, has the objective that throughout the workshop managers can learn to identify processes or services that can be improved with data science.

The classes – conducted thanks to the support of the Public Innovators Network of the Government Laboratory and the Civil Service – were designed between the GobLab and the Center for Data Science and Public Policy of the University of Chicago and is taught by the academics of the School of Government of Adolfo Ibáñez University, María Paz Hermosilla and Andrés Letelier.

Among those attending the course are officials from fifty state agencies such as Carabineros de Chile, Senate, Labor Direction, CORFO, FONASA, SII, ministries, municipalities, Council for Transparency, Servel, among others.

Among the attendees the following perceptions stand out:

• Lidia Fuentes, Head of the Press Department, Senate: “It is essential to have a broader vision for the analysis and understanding of the problems and realities that surround us. I think that with the current technological and social challenges multidisciplinary and complex perspectives are required, that is why I want to acquire new skills in this area ”.
• General Berta Robles, Chief of the Carabineros Family Prevention and Protection Zone: “My expectations of the course are many. It helped me to focus on the project that we have raised for our service that is Carabineros. Understand how data can help, in the case of our project, many children in our country. ”
• Guillermo Marín, Advisor to the General Undersecretariat of the Presidency: “Before the course, I had an expectation that was formed by what is found in the media about data science and Big Data and its concepts. After this day we were able to land those concepts that are sometimes a little fuzzy ”.
• Carlos Sans, Head of the Statistics Department of the Ministry of Health: “This first day has been essential to focus and define what we want to do. Likewise, the course allows us to interact with different people, compare experiences, make contact networks, start working as a team to align, and have a goal together ”.