CARE Water+ Dashboard and Data Visualization Project
Fall 2020
Develop for Good is an intercollegiate technology/design organization that aims to generate social good by providing web app and development services with non-profits. Some of our most notable partners include UNICEF, the World Bank, the Nature Conservancy and the World Health Organization. Check us out at https://www.developforgood.org/!
Project Summary
CARE is a global, multi-sector humanitarian and development organization, focused on overcoming poverty and social injustice, and committed to improving the lives of women and girls. CARE has 75 years of experience in assisting and empowering the most vulnerable people and communities, across rural and urban contexts. Within this multi-sector approach, CARE’s Water Team focuses on systems strengthening and institutional development to ensure sustainable and equitable water and sanitation services for all. The team draws on the rich experience of CARE Country Offices, and leads CARE’s global water portfolio, which encompasses programs in sustainable Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) services and sustained behavior change, water for agriculture and multiple use, water resources management and climate resilience, and water in emergency and conflict settings. The team recognizes that water is inherently intersectoral and works across CARE’s program areas and sectors to multiply impact.
Because CARE’s water portfolio encompasses multi-disciplinary programming in over 50 countries, the Water Team has a need to visualize and easily capture the geographic scope, key outcomes, and capacities of our development programming through the creation of a Water+ map and data dashboard. Rather than having to search for program evaluations and documents, users would be able to use this dashboard to easily understand and explore CARE’s broad water portfolio. Multiple internal and external audiences would benefit from the use of this dashboard. Within CARE, Country Offices would use this dashboard to better identify where complementary Water+ programming is, allowing them to more easily connect with colleagues across CARE to strengthen mutual learning and collaboration. Externally, donors, partners, and the general public would use the map and data dashboard to easily understand where the Water Team works, what its work entails, and the different ways in which people have benefited from its programming.
We were tasked with creating an interactive dashboard and map to intuitively visualize a database of humanitarian projects provided by our nonprofit client.
The Challenge
Our most significant challenge was to select a framework for our visualization. We explored a wide range of tools and applications which could most adequately meet the requirements outlined by our client while also remaining within the scope of our available human resources and project time-frame.
The Team
Jane Boettcher, Stanford University 2021
Jack Boettcher, Harvard University
Leonid Basevich, Brooklyn College 2020
Mai Anh Nguyen, Bryn Mawr College 2023,
Our Solution
About halfway through the project time-frame we definitively settled on using the Tableau data visualization software. Tableau had the functionality to meet our project goals of combining an interactive map and dashboard with robust data selection features and an ease of update and maintenance for our clients.
View our project here: https://public.tableau.com/profile/jane.boettcher#!/vizhome/trial2_16074950271960/Dashboard
Project Screenshots
Our Impact
Our visualization provides a quick and intuitive entry-point to our client’s complex and substantial database of projects. This visualization will serve both the internal administrative needs of our client and the needs of external parties seeking access to our client’s diverse array of services.
