Since mid-2015, InterWorks has worked hand-in-hand with the Tableau Foundation on some particularly special projects. As part of their mission, the Tableau Foundation empowers select organizations with the tools and knowledge needed to impact others through data.
InterWorks has helped them achieve this mission by providing Tableau training for numerous organizations: Equal Opportunity Schools, Community Technology Alliance and StriveTogether, as well as Data for Democracy and the Center for Disease Control & Prevention in Southeast Asia. We’ll be focusing on the first three as InterWorks’ Robert Curtis already shared his experiences with Data for Democracy and the CDC on our blog.
EO Schools
Equal Opportunity Schools partners with school, district, county and state leaders around the country, identifying thousands of “missing students” and developing systems to ensure these capable students are enrolling and succeeding in the high school classes that will best prepare them to achieve their college goals.
In May 2015, Tableau made what was then its largest grant ever through the Tableau Foundation to EO Schools as part of its effort to enroll 100,000 low-income students and students of color in Advanced Placement (AP) and International Baccalaureate (IB) high school classes across the country.
InterWorks joined with Tableau in supporting EO Schools by providing Tableau Desktop training at no additional cost. In June of 2015, InterWorks’ Enablement Practice Lead Carly Capitula led two groups from the nonprofit through Desktop Fundamentals courses at the Tableau offices in Seattle. EO Schools gathers a wide variety of data from their partner schools (mostly survey data) and is using Tableau for internal analysis as well as eventually developing dashboard to share back with their clients and funders.
Learn more about the Tableau Foundation’s work with EO Schools >>
Community Technology Alliance
Community Technology Alliance (CTA) is committed to ending homelessness in Santa Clara County, California by using data to better meet strategic needs. They focus on ways in which databases and other tools can communicate exchange data.
In 2016, InterWorks delivered Fundamentals and Advanced Tableau training course for CTA to give them a firm grasp on data visualization in Tableau. Considering CTA’s focus is on making data ready for analysis and visualization, these training sessions were invaluable. With considerable Tableau knowledge of their own, CTA will be able to help communities glean more insight from their data, thus helping them to serve people with greater effect.
StriveTogether
StriveTogether is a large networked organization whose members focus on improving outcomes for K-12 students throughout the U.S. Their goal is to bring together parents, educators, civic leaders and local employers to positively affect the educational outcomes of countless children. The data fellowship concept run by StriveTogether, brings together 15 data managers in a cohort, teaches them Tableau and other skills related to data use, and gives the data managers access to a group of people who are doing similar work to theirs.
InterWorks’ role in the partnership was to provide support and training. The first training was a virtual Fundamentals course led by Carly in late 2015. In Spring of 2016, InterWorks took them to the next level with an Advanced course. All the while, InterWorks’ Tableau Server guru Brad Fair was providing ongoing Server support for them. Most recently, InterWorks led another custom Tableau training course at StriveTogether headquarters in Washington, D.C.
But InterWorks provided more than just Tableau-specific support across the project. InterWorks’ Stephanie Kennedy also delivered a course focused entirely on data preparation. All of these trainings were delivered to two cohorts comprised of 30 data fellows.
Throughout these multiple trainings, StriveTogether has progressively learned the ins and outs of Tableau and their data. With such a large network, they have several uses for Tableau. InterWorks worked hand in hand with them to ensure they were well equipped with the breadth of knowledge necessary to handle any challenge they dared to tackle. The results have been near immediate, and StriveTogether is making great use of the Tableau skills taught to them over the course of these trainings.
Learn more about the Tableau Foundation’s work with StriveTogether >>
“I’ve had the chance to work closely with all of the data fellows in that network, and we’re seeing a pretty significant systems change within the organization. A lot of that is thanks to InterWorks. We’ve had nearly 30 people get trained up Tableau, but since StriveTogether is structured as a partnership of many organizations, this means that nearly 30 organizations now have a Tableau expert within them.”
“This is where the huge impact is – that all of these organizations can more effectively use data to power decision making. This ultimately has an impact on the educational and career outcomes of all of the students served by these organizations.”
– Jason Schumacher, Senior Program Manager, Tableau Foundation
Joining Tableau Service Corps
Given InterWorks’ willingness to help and our competency in all things Tableau, the Tableau Foundation knew InterWorks would be a great fit for Tableau Service Corps. Tableau Service Corps send the best and brightest Tableau trainers to do free trainings through the Tableau Foundation. While InterWorks continues to help at a larger, organizational scale, we’ve also had several of our Tableau trainers commit to the Tableau Service Corps.
We’re excited to see where this opportunity will take InterWorks. Even though we do consulting and training for a living, we’re always on the lookout for ways in which we can help organizations who are positively impacting others. What’s better than giving back by doing what you do best?
Does Your Nonprofit Need Help?
If you’re part of a nonprofit organization looking for Tableau assistance, we encourage you to reach out to the Tableau Foundation. If you’re new to Tableau or are simply looking for help right away, InterWorks is also only a call or click away! Get in touch with us today and start making more of your data.
