BIDS Senior Fellow Joshua Blumenstock is offering these four data science projects through UC Berkeley's Undergraduate Research Apprentice Program (URAP).
The Data-Intensive Development Lab at UC Berkeley is providing data science support to the governments of several Low and Middle Income Countries, as well as humanitarian organizations like GiveDirectly, who are doing their best to effectively respond to the evolving humanitarian crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. So far, we have provided technical support to governments in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Ghana, Mali, Mexico, Nigeria, Senegal, Sudan, Togo, and Uganda.
The main focus of current work is on using data science methods (machine learning, computer science, statistics, econometrics, interactive data visualization) to help governments get emergency cash aid to those who need it most. You can read a short article by Prof. Blumenstock about these efforts here: Machine learning can help get COVID-19 aid to those who need it most (Nature, May 2020).
