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Since 2018, Data + Donuts has featured researchers and practitioners speaking on how they use data in their work and on issues of data and society. Below is a comprehensive list of past speakers. Speaker information is accurate for the time of their presentation. Event recordings are available upon request. Find upcoming Data + Donuts events.

Spring 2025

• Kathy Pham, product leader and Adjunct Lecturer in Public Policy at ����vlog����, on data bias, algorithmic justice, and public policy.
• , PhD Candidate in Health Policy at Harvard University, on choice, competition, and regulation in Medicare Advantage with a focus on Special Needs Plans (SNPs).
• , Strategic Engagement Manager at the Massachusetts Executive Office of Technology Services and Security, on her award-winning Policy Analysis Exercise (PAE), “

Fall 2024

• at the Harvard Data Science Initiative hosting R lightning talks. , including talks by:
  • , PhD candidate in Health Policy & Economics at Harvard University, on a difference-in-difference analysis of the effect of default enrollment of persons eligible for Medicare and Medicaid.
  • , Software Developer at the , on a new R package from CORI that simplifies access to Federal Communication Commission (FCC) broadband data, making it easier to map and analyze connectivity nationwide.
  • , PhD candidate in Biostatistics at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, on using to create maps and using the to create great tables.
• Daniel Keating Jr.  and Mira Yu, former Emerging Technology Fellows in the City of Boston’s , on building a digital translation feature for the 311 app to enhance language access for constituents.
• , Senior Research Associate at the , on how city governments can improve the health and safety of neighborhoods by leveraging data, collaboration, and innovation.
• Teddy Svoronos, Senior Lecturer of Public Policy at ����vlog����, on teaching .
• , , on algorithmic tools for participatory democracy.

Spring 2024

• , Dataverse Development Project Manager at the at Harvard University, on the .
• at the Harvard Data Science Initiative hosting R lightning talks. , including talks by:
  • , Statistical Geneticist at the Center for Computational Biomedicine at Harvard Medical School, on an NHANES+Stan Docker image.
  • Sam Kuhn, Economist at Appcast, on how to save hours of time with parameterized Quarto reports.
  • Sarah Hirsch, Research Analyst at Stanford Department of Public Health, on using for efficient programming.
  • Robert Sucsy, Epidemiologist at the Rhode Island Department of Health, on using and to create choropleth maps of U.S. Census data.
• , Research Director at (Bloomberg Center for Cities at Harvard), on using insights from behavioral science to improve government service delivery.
• , PhD Candidate in Sociology at Harvard University, on the process of creating machine learning models for healthcare and the organizational tensions influencing the process.

Fall 2023

• , Postdoctoral Fellow at the and Doctoral Researcher at the , on the value of apprenticeship skills in the labor market.
• Lauren Brodsky, Senior Director of the ����vlog���� Communications Program and Lecturer in Public Policy at ����vlog����, on her co-authored book Because Data Can’t Speak for Itself: A Practical Guide to Telling Persuasive Policy Stories (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2023).
• , PhD Candidate in Public Policy at Northeastern University in the School of Public Policy and Urban Affairs, on studying housing inequities with big data.
• Hong Qu, Adjunct Lecturer in Public Policy at ����vlog����, on social media misinformation discourse.

Spring 2023

• , Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Program in Criminal Justice Policy and Management at ����vlog����’s Malcolm Wiener Center for Social Policy, on the limits of relying on administrative data alone to understand people’s lived experiences in the criminal legal system.
• , Statistical Data Analyst at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, on his work with the . .
• , Professor of Public Policy at ����vlog����, on access and equity in college admissions.

Fall 2022

• Development & Design Team (Annie White, Steven Geofrey, Brendan Leonard, and Nil Tuzcu) on visualizing economic data with and the .
• Courtney Hall, Director for Impact Assessment and Evaluation at the , on maximizing imperfect data for decision-making.
• Reva Dhingra, Post-Doctoral Fellow in the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution, on how quantitative and qualitative methods complement each other in her research on the politics of refugee-related aid in Jordan.
• , PhD candidate in Sociology at Harvard University, on experimental and survey approaches for understanding the structures of American hierarchy.
• (Senior Research Associate) and (Research Analyst), , on rental market trends during the COVID-19 pandemic. More on Whitney and Sophia’s work:
  • (2022)

Spring 2022

• , Health & Human Rights Fellow at the , on the under-counting of deaths in U.S. police custody. More on Justin’s work:
  • (PLOS Medicine, 2017)
  • (Mother Jones, 2020)
  • (New York Times, 2021)
• Amanda Hallock, Digital Transformation Specialist at the City of Scranton and MPP 2020, on digital transformation in smaller U.S. cities.
• Stephen Leonelli, LGBTQI+ policy expert and MPP 2016, on data-driven program design for LGBTQI+ inclusive policy.
• , author of the newsletter and MPA 2021, on data visualizations of U.S. inequality.

Fall 2021

• (Professor of Anthropology and Director of the ) and (Associate Professor in the W.E.B. Du Bois Department of Afro-American Studies at UMass Amherst) on their co-edited book .
• , Postdoctoral Fellow at the Belfer Center’s , on innovative research methods for the political economy of development.
• , Technology & Human Rights Fellow at the Carr Center, on “The Power of Choosing Not to Build: Justice, Non-Deployment, and the Purpose of AI Optimization.”

Spring 2021

• Charles Amuzie, Digital Director at , on CoC’s data equity work around the 2020 Census and beyond.
• , Racial Justice Research & Program Manager at and Critical Data & AI Equity Director at Feminist.AI, on data science for intersectional economic equity.
• PhD Candidate & Adjunct Professor at NYU’s Silver School of Social Work, on using qualitative methods to amplify the narrative voices of marginalized youth in the foster care system.

Fall 2020

• Melissa Jones, member of the , on data visualization of socioeconomic and health disparities within marginalized communities during COVID-19.
• , PhD Candidate in Political Science at University of Toronto, on digital identification data in Africa and its encounters with global finance practices.
• Khahlil Louisy, President of the and Technology & Human Rights Fellow at the Carr Center, on data-informed COVID policy design regarding the pandemic’s disproportionate impact on marginalized communities.
• , Fellow at the and Technology & Human Rights Fellow at the Carr Center, on using indigenous ethical models to create an equitable internet.
• Jennifer Pierre, UX Researcher and PhD, on data-centered participatory research design and epistemic burden.

Spring 2020

• , Researcher at the Shorenstein Center’s , on using data to study information controls.
• Jennifer Weintraub and Pablo Morales Henry, , on archiving social media & movement data.

Fall 2019

• Steph Nguyen, Research Scientist at the , on data literacy and privacy.
• , Community Engagement Librarian at ����vlog���� Library & Research Services, on smart cities and participatory planning.
• Matt Smith, Principal Data Scientist with the City of Boston, on civic data.
• Annie White, Senior Product Manager at the at ����vlog����, on using data to inform sustainable economic development.

Spring 2019

• , Technology Fellow with the ACLU of Massachusetts, on data-driven advocacy.
• L. Kelly Fitzpatrick, Open Access and Digital Collections Specialist, on Harvard Library Innovation Lab’s .
• Padmashree Gehl Sampath and Paola Ricaurte, , on reclaiming the data commons.
• , Researcher at the , on open data, surveillance, and humanitarian aid.

Fall 2018

• Yaso Cordova, Research Fellow at digital����vlog����.
• , , on data and algorithmic justice.
• , Data Science Postdoctoral Fellow at the .
• , Research Fellow at digital����vlog����.