The U.S. Digital Response Team was started by three former U.S. Deputy CTOs (one who was a leader on the healthcare.gov rescue effort, one who founded Code for America, and one who leads the Digital Service Collaborative at Georgetown University’s Beeck Center) and a technical executive formerly from Facebook and Stripe. Together we have already sourced 500+ qualified people willing to help and skilled in technology, data, design, and operations. Many of our volunteers have worked at the U.S. Digital Service, 18F, Code for America, or in federal, state or local government and are already well aware of the constraints of working with a bureaucracy. Respect for public service and public servants is a baseline requirement for all our volunteers, in addition to a drive to help.
We have heard from state and local governments that they need help:
Making it easier to collect and collate data from private and public testing facilities
Keeping websites and systems that are under unprecedented strain from going down (i.e. benefit application systems for unemployment insurance, etc.)
Building a digital product for the public to self-assess before driving to a testing center
Building/implementing a system to better collect and track data from hospitals about their bed and ventilator capacity
Re-imaging and distributing laptops to EOCs
From data scientists with modeling and mapping infection data
With project & general operational management, as well as supply chain and procurement expertise
That’s fine. Just reach out and we’ll work with you to see how we can help.
We’ll also use your feedback to identify common needs across localities and share tools and best practices back with you as we find them.
We are asking volunteers to select from among these skills:
Data Science
Front-End Engineering
Back-End Engineering
Product Management
Site Reliability Engineering and Operations
User Research / Design
General Management
Manufacturing & Production
Logistics & Supply Chain
Procurement
Healthcare
Public Health / Epidemiology
Health Diagnostics
Disaster Relief and Response
Anyone in government working to address the COVID-19 crisis can request to work with volunteers. Non-governmental efforts can apply, but will be prioritized lower than government needs.
We have identified volunteers all over the U.S. We hope to help as many state and local governments as possible, and will actively tap our network in your state if we don’t already have someone there. That said, much work is happening remotely now, so you may be able to use someone from anywhere in the country. We find that knowledge of the state or region is useful, so regardless of remote work we will try to match you with someone close to you.
There is a “SWAT” team led by the White House and the Department of Health & Human Services that’s working to accelerate access to testing and resources, and some of our volunteers are being tapped to join this.