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This app maker says his work saved thousands during Hurricane Harvey — and he's not done yet

Ryan Duffy

April 17, 2018 |

The Verge |

Multi-Media |

1500-3000 Words

Response Location: United States, Houston, Texas

After Hurricane Harvey, it was hard to locate people amidst the swaths of water covering the city. Two Houstonians developed a “web-based geolocation service” that used data from social media to locate and visualize people’s location. Since then, they’ve updated their service and it’s been used for other catastrophes, helping rescue as many as 37,000 people.

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A High-Paying Job? Go to App Boot Camp.

Tina Rosenberg

April 17, 2018 |

The New York Times |

Text |

1500-3000 Words

Response Location: United States, New York, New York

Coding positions can provide a stable job with a middle class salary, however—due to a lack of opportunities, the cost of education, and the culture at tech companies—women and especially women of color have a difficult time obtaining these jobs. A series of initiatives are addressing this issue, providing comprehensive training, job placement, and affordable ways to pay for education.

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AI tool helps law enforcement find victims of human trafficking

Alexandra Ossola

April 16, 2018 |

Futurism |

Multi-Media |

800-1500 Words

Response Location: United States

When Emily Kennedy was a teenager traveling in Eastern Europe she saw street kids she learned were trafficked by the Russian mob and decided to tackle human trafficking in her college work. The company she launched, Marinus Analytics, created a software application that has been used by authorities to rescue hundreds of victims in the U.S. and Canada and is expanding. The data it gathers has also debunked assumptions about how and where trafficking takes place.

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Here's how The New York Times is trying to preserve millions of old pages the way they were originally published

Shan Wang

April 12, 2018 |

Nieman Lab |

Multi-Media |

Over 15 Minutes

Response Location: United States, New York

Project Kondo has identified and archived over 7 million New York Times web pages that contain news content in outdated and unsupported formats. Readers can report broken links, but the number of sites to review is too big to do by hand, so the team created an automated tool called ‘munger’ to identify JavaScript with unsupported code and clean it up into HTML that can be shared widely. In order to preserve the content exactly how it was originally published, the websites are moved to a different domain, archive.nytimes.com, where readers are notified that they are reading an archived article.

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A LinkedIn to combat rights abuse?

Emmanuel Freudenthal

March 29, 2018 |

The New Humanitarian (formerly IRIN) |

Multi-Media |

Under 800 Words

Response Location: Nigeria

Who Was In Command, is a database that publishes the “names, ranks, and command responsibilities of security forces in Nigeria, Egypt, and Mexico.” That’s because when security forces use excessive force, and commit human rights abuses, often people don’t know their name, and can’t report them. Now, the names are all available in one website.

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Motorbike-sharing app helps tackle Nepal's transport woes

Deepak Adhikari

March 24, 2018 |

Nikkei Asian Review |

Text |

800-1500 Words

Response Location: Nepal, Kathmandu

Motorbike sharing apps provide an alternative to traffic congestion and crowded public transportation in Nepal. The tech startup, Tootle, connects users to motorbike drivers with its ride-sharing app. Motorbikes offer a cheaper alternative to taxis and a less-crowded alternative to public transportation—a feature particularly lauded by female users. The startup has also received a grant from the United Nations Capital Development Fund to expand the services it offers.

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When Iraqi women face discrimination, her legal clinic can help

Sara Manisera

March 23, 2018 |

The Christian Science Monitor |

Text |

800-1500 Words

Response Location: Iraq, Baghdad

The Shahrazad Center in Baghdad offers workshops and free legal services to women experiencing domestic abuse, violence, threats and gender-based discrimination. Lawyer Rajaa Abd Ali says, “Here we teach women their rights, because education is the most powerful weapon for them.”

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City Rolls Out Tech Platform to Improve — and Ration — Shelter, Housing for the Homeless

Rob Waters

March 08, 2018 |

San Francisco Public Press |

Text |

800-1500 Words

Response Location: United States, San Francisco, California

In San Francisco, a new online navigation system based off the theory of coordinated entry is merging separate databases into one to track the city's homeless population. The system uses this information to prioritize their limited housing stock - but it also means the process can become more complicated for some families in the system.

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Reading, Writing, Evicted: How Austin, Texas, hopes to combat student turnover

Bethany Barnes

March 01, 2018 |

Oregon Live |

Text |

1500-3000 Words

Response Location: United States, Austin, Texas

When families are priced out of their homes in hot housing markets because of increasing property values/rental prices, they often have to move to new educational districts, pulling children out of their schools in the middle of the year and stalling progress. In Austin, the Austin Independent School District is using a new tool, Mobility Blueprint, to help families find affordable housing within their educational district.

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Thousands of poor young people are using Minecraft to redesign their cities

Odette Chalaby

January 29, 2018 |

Apolitical |

Text |

800-1500 Words

Response Location: India, Mumbai

Too often, poor community members are not included in public discourse over how public spaces should look-- rather, the urban planning is more top-down. To change that, the UN’s Block by Block project is using the computer game Minecraft to include locals in shaping the physical spaces in their own communities by teaching them digital design skills. The UN program has engaged over 17,000 people, and 20 crowdsourced designs have already been built in cities around the world.

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