About the speaker
Andrew Schroeder is the Vice President of Research and Analysis for Direct Relief. He leads Direct Relief’s work in data science, GIS, and humanitarian innovation. His work has been published or featured in outlets including Science, The Lancet, PLoS Digital Health, American Journal of Public Health, New York Times, Washington Post, Fast Company, Wired, The New Humanitarian, Prehospital and Disaster Medicine, and the International Journal of Cancer. He has previously worked in a consulting and advisory capacity for the United Nations Development Program and the World Food Programme, and as a member of the health data experts committee for Meta (formerly Facebook).
Dr. Schroeder is the co-founder, along with colleagues at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Harvard Medical School, and Harvard Data Science Initiative, of CrisisReady, a research and response platform that builds analytic capacity along with new digital tools for translating private data into public good for disasters and health emergencies. He is also the co-founder and former Board President of the global nonprofit WeRobotics.org, which builds local capacity in robotics applications for humanitarian aid, development, and global health in nearly 40 countries around the world.
Abstract: Novel data sources and AI are rapidly changing the landscape of analytics for global health and humanitarian aid. The non-profit Direct Relief and the CrisisReady collaboration with Harvard Data Science Initiative are at the forefront of a range of applications in real-time analysis ranging from the use of human mobility data to measure population dynamics in crisis to large language models for humanitarian information synthesis and climate resilience. Andrew Schroeder will discuss the emerging possibilities and persistent challenges of novel data and AI through the lens of Direct Relief and CrisisReady’s global humanitarian response operations
About the Series: The HDSI Data Science in Industry Seminar series provides the opportunity for Harvard students, faculty, and postdoctoral fellows to hear directly from industry data scientists about the role data science plays in their organization, the methods and techniques being used, and their own career trajectory.