Data Equity Principle 7

Description

Inequitable power dynamics between data users and communities can perpetuate the disparities that data users aim to address. However, these power dynamics are not inevitable: data users can and should proactively mitigate unintended consequences by involving communities in all phases of the data life cycle, from planning through co-creating solutions. Intentional engagement can promote mutual understanding of assets and challenges within a community, ensuring that data projects are relevant to communities, and that results can be used to drive meaningful change. Restoring communities as data experts involves more than simply offering a seat at the table. It means creating roles for community members to meaningfully impact or lead decision making, valuing their expertise as an integral part of the process, and building relationships rooted in respect to bridge data, policy, and practice.

Data users should seek to understand which communities are affected, both directly and indirectly, by the issue being addressed. In the context of E-W systems, community members might include students, families, educators, and more. Data users should further consider identifying which groups are adversely affected through an intersectional lens, such as Black students with disabilities. Then, data users should identify ways to embed community perspectives throughout the project, starting with its conception. Single, point-in-time engagement is typically insufficient—isolated outreach after decisions have been made may be seen as a “box-checking” exercise to nominally gather input. For example, rather than facilitate a single community listening session, data users might recruit community members with relevant lived experience for a recurring advisory council. In its most robust form, this might take the form of CBPR, in which community members actively engage as equal partners in the data project. However, no engagement model is one-size-fits-all, and community members might play a variety of roles depending on the project’s scope, purpose, and timeline.^xxxiii Building in multiple entry points and avenues for engagement or feedback is essential.

Communities, especially marginalized communities, are often burdened with data initiatives that extract information for personal and institutional gain. To build trusting and productive relationships, data users should define clear roles and expectations for engagement, while collaborating with community partners to determine preferred engagement methods (for example, is it more feasible for community members to participate virtually or in person? During the workday or in the evening? Would they prefer to provide written or verbal feedback?) and opportunities to reduce barriers to participation (for example, by providing child care for in-person activities). Community members should also be equitably compensated to ensure that the partnership is mutually beneficial, and to signal that community members’ time and expertise are valued at levels commensurate with that of other experts. Data users should look for opportunities to build capacity within the community as part of the engagement (for example, through collaborative learning processes for data analysis and interpretation) to promote the community’s ability to advocate for itself and drive sustained progress beyond the conclusion of the data project. Engaging community members and co-creating opportunities to honor their expert knowledge are foundational activities to successfully implement all data equity principles described in this report.

^{xxxiii See Methods and Emerging Strategies to Engage People with Lived Experience (Skelton-Wilson et al., 2020) for a discussion of various roles for individuals with lived experience, including storyteller, advisor, grantee, partner, or staff member.}