Geo-Light Database Systems
Using Data for Decisions
Shortening Data Access from Months to Minutes
For a short, animated look at how our systems work, please click HERE.
Geo Education & Research has teamed with Lightstone Data to create an integral approach to evaluation and the collection, storage, analysis and reporting of data to document agency work and results. The software you will see in the link allows agencies to create more opportunities for funding by showing potential grantees the good work that they are doing. It also allows agencies to gauge their success on an ongoing basis so they can become more nimble in addressing performance challenges and the changing environments in which they operate. We couple this system with our community development and empowerment approaches to evaluation design (tailored to each user’s needs). We develop simple or complex (but always meaningful) methods for identifying expected outcomes (results) and for developing appropriate ways to measure them.
As an example, surveys may be a useful way to measure progress, but too often they end up in the back of someone’s file cabinet. This system not only allows surveys or many other types of data to be easily managed (with the questions and range of responses designed by you) but has numerous reports to show what it all means. The minute the data are input, users of the system can paint a picture of the agency’s real-world engagement by easily creating a table and image (e.g., pie chart, bar chart, graph) to display the results. These reports can be easily exported for use in written reports or web pages. Users can also subscribe to them and have them emailed to them on a time frame of their choice. Since it is hosted on a secure, password-protected website that is regularly backed up, the data can be entered and the reports can be generated from anywhere and hundreds of people can use the system simultaneously, with no per-user fees.
The International Criminal Court uses a system we built to collect data in several African countries. Staff there and in The Hague in The Netherlands can run reports anytime to see the activities and results of their work with victims and can aggregate reporting from village to the national levels. National Safe Place uses a system with nearly 40 canned but customizable reports to allow colleagues in 150 youth homeless shelters to enter, store, and report on their data at any time. Consequently, data in these systems are being used daily and also make developing annual or quarterly reports a breeze.
But enough talk. See what this system can do by viewing a short video describing our online databases
Download a description here: