Digital

  • Data Science Accelerator launches for 2022

    7th October 2022 by

    After months of planning, we were delighted to finally be able to bring the Data Science Accelerator cohort of participants and mentors for 2022 together with The Data Lab at our recent launch event in Edinburgh. This year marks the fifth edition of this innovative capability building programme and we are delighted to welcome 16 applicants and volunteer mentors onto the accelerator.

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  • Draft principles for unlocking the value of Scotland’s public sector personal data for public benefit

    19th August 2022 by

    Members of the Independent Expert Group on Unlocking the Value of Public Data for Public Benefit, have been working over the summer on a draft set of principles to guide decision-making by data controllers in the Scottish public sector. I want to thank my fellow IEG members for their contributions to these draft principles.

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  • Data and Intelligence Network comes of age

    1st August 2022 by

    May 2020 was where it began as the need to collaborate across organisations was recognised to support decision making and management around the COVID-19 pandemic. Gartner was commissioned to lead a taskforce to create a Scottish cross-agency network which would foster collaboration across the public sector’s data community. Thus the Scottish Government COVID-19 Data & Intelligence Network was born.

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  • How the Data Science Accelerator sparked a solution to meet a Covid data challenge

    21st July 2022 by

    Blog by Joyce Dalgleish, Business Change Manager, Scottish Public Sector Analytical Collaborative. The Data Science Accelerator is a 12 week development programme that gives public sector analysts the opportunity to build their data science skills through project-based mentoring. Delivered by the Scottish Public Sector Analytical Collaborative (SPACe), the accelerator is helping to develop data science capability...

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  • Next steps for Scotland’s Official Statistics Open Data platform

    14th July 2022 by

    Blog by Victoria Avila and Martin Macfie, Data Division, Digital Directorate In the Open Data team within Scottish Government, part of our role is to manage the publication of open datasets on statistics.gov.scot. This is the open data publishing platform for Official Statistics in Scotland. The platform contains around 300 datasets and reference datasets published...

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  • Unlocking the Value of Public Sector Data for Public Benefit: Blog #3

    12th July 2022 by

    In June 2022, the Independent Expert Group (IEG) came together for the fourth time, as part of our series of monthly meetings. As a collection of experts from different sectors, backgrounds and practices, the group is united in its aim to advise the Scottish Government on how personal dataset-holders in the Scottish public sector can make decisions about how these datasets might be used by the private sector. The group wishes to ensure that whenever this occurs, it has to be of public benefit to the people of Scotland, in ways that promote transparency and trust.

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  • Recommendations from COP26

    8th July 2022 by

    We've had further discussions with round table attendees and relevant digital and climate change experts about the top ideas that came out of each round table theme. After these discussions concluded, each of the top ideas was thoroughly investigated and then presented as recommendations to Kate Forbes, Cabinet Secretary for Finance and the Economy and Michael Matheson, Cabinet Secretary for Net Zero, Energy and Transport. These recommendations that are detailed below, were all accepted by both Cabinet Secretaries.

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  • Unlocking the Value of Public Data – Third meeting of the Independent Expert Group

    10th June 2022 by

    Guest blog by Annie Sorbie, Lecturer in Law (Medical Law and Ethics), University of Edinburgh, and Member of the Independent Expert Group for Unlocking the Value of Public Data. The Independent Expert Group met in May for the third of our series of monthly meetings. Our task is to advise the Scottish Government on how...

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  • Data and Intelligence Network sets out future plans

    1st June 2022 by

    Blog by Lewis McCathie, Communications and Engagement Manager, Data & Intelligence Network. Created by the Scottish Government in 2020 to provide evidence-based analysis in response to the Covid-19 pandemic, Data & Intelligence Network (DIN) is now looking to build upon this by supporting a number of Scottish Government policy areas so to utilise public sector...

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  • Developing a Data Transformation Framework

    26th May 2022 by

    In Scotland, Public Sector organisations have been creating, using and managing data for many years, and the practices around this have sometimes developed organically meaning there may be a lack of consistency when approaching things like data management, skills and standards.

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