Veteran and business owner, Ricardo Torres believes, "in serving those who served...”. In the military the term "We got your 6" is used to assure others that they were looking out them. If you picture yourself at the center of a clock face, the area directly in front of you is twelve o’clock. Six o’clock is what lies behind you. On a battlefield, your “six” is the most vulnerable. So, when someone tells you that they’ve “got your six,” it means they’re watching your back.  

Vereti Concepts' through the WEGOTUR6 program is doing exactly that, looking out for our veterans by providing opportunities, programs and scholarships to help veterans grow their business and or careers. 

Learn more about WEGOTUR6 here.  

Mass shootings have increased by 57% in the last 3 years compared over the past 6 years. The US had 7 mass shootings in 2019, 12 in 2018 and 11 in 2017. In 3 years there have been a total of 30 mass shootings and 987 victims. Hover over bubbles to explore the data.

Written By: Rosa Torres

I fell in love with data the moment I realized its power--its ability to tell human stories. It was thrilling to watch data unfold and reveal stories of change.

I no longer just saw data on a chart; I saw a human story behind every data point. It became my goal to find the best way to represent that data such that it could tell those stories. Data visualization became my tool and my passion.

The more I delved into my work, the more I saw how truly interdisciplinary it was. Data visualization involves many different branches of knowledge. In my work, I have combined my data analytics background with studies in design, psychology, and my deepest area of study: visual thinking, the process by which people see and process information. I studied the work of Dr. Colin Ware to learn how people visually think.

According to Ware, in Visual Queries: the Foundation of Visual Thinking, “visual queries on displays can be faster and more effective than queries to access data in the brain and this is the reason why we think best with the aid of cognitive tools.” Data visualization is one of these cognitive tools for visual thinking that allows viewers to more effectively see information and store it in their visual memories.

Studies show that a person sees what is in their direct field of vision. This means that we have the ability to see the information we are focused on--everything else will fall to the background.

Try this exercise: focus on the green center of this digital nucleus. Try to count as many of the dots as you can.

Don’t worry, whatever number you came up with, you won’t be tested on it. Do, however, notice that the blue areas, although visible, were not as in focus as the green was. By giving the green space importance, you only truly paid attention to that space.

Now, let’s review some visual content.

Dr. Colin Ware found that we can hold 3 to 5 objects in our visual memory. He also states that our brains are always searching for patterns. It is the identification of these patterns that helps us process information.

Look at the map below; note the first thing that catches your attention.

Did you notice the map of the state of New Jersey or the number of students served? Or did something else drawn you in? Everyone’s experience can be different, but how we can scan and process information is the same.

We scan visual content looking for patterns in order to interpret what we are seeing. We scan shapes, color, space, and words and we associate them in groups that help us discover a pattern and ultimately the story behind the image.

A visual story may have micro stories that work together to stitch together the bigger story. If these stories draw on our emotions, then there will be a stronger limbic system response as opposed to a frontal cortex response. This difference in activation will cause that information to have different perceptual significance and will, therefore, be stored differently. Emotional memories are more readily coded into long term memories than just straight facts. Plain facts need repetition and confirmation, whereas emotional memories can “take a shortcut.”

Learning about the way the human brain senses and perceives information and how it can be utilized to create informed data has become a passion of mine. I believe that data storytelling is vital in taking beige facts and turning them into a rich story that can be followed and related to. My pursuit of purpose has led me to this extraordinary field of data and visualizations through which I can capture human stories and create pathways that create connections, inspire, and drive social change.

References:

[1] Ware, Colin Visual Queries. Retrieved from

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/221520317_Visual_Queries_The_Foundation_of_Visual_Thinking

[2] Tatler, B. W., Wade, N. J., Kwan, H., Findlay, J. M., & Velichkovsky, B. M. (n.d.). Yarbus, eye movements, and vision. Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3563050/ 

At Tech in the Commons, nonprofit pros learned about using data to maximize impact - Generocity Philly

Tech in the Commons, Generocity's third annual free reporting and event series on digital engagement strategies for place-based nonprofits, returned on Wednesday, June 26 for its first session of 2019. The session, hosted at MakeOffices and supported by Comcast NBCUniversal, focused on ways to use census data to improve access to resources and education and strengthen data storytelling.

Imagine being given a life-changing opportunity by someone.  Someone who will develop your talents. Someone who will provide an environment for you to learn. Someone who will create a career path for you. Now imagine someone who believes they can do this for thousands of students.

This is Hopeworks.

An organization filled with people who see themselves as the "someone" that can make a difference for our youth. Hopeworks is a non profit with a business plan. They find clients looking for technologist and place students who train with them. It's a win-win for students and clients. See how Hopeworks is shaping the 'Community + Business' advantage. Explore this data visualization to see their impact.

The Science Center is taking Philly’s entrepreneurial ecosystem to new heights! Vereti Concepts is excited to partner with SC to produce their Commercialization Impact report. Explore the full report here.

Global warming is more than a problem of rising temperatures, it's a concern for the affects it has on our environment and health. It was a pleasure to work with Dr. Jeremy Hoffman, earth scientist and researcher at the Science Museum of Virginia to produce this Heat Vulnerability Visualization. We are moving the conversation beyond is "Global warming happening?" to discuss, "What are we going to do about it?" In this viz we compare the high impervious areas and low canopy areas to temperatures on a summer day in July. No surprise that the unshaded urban areas are the hottest. When combined with economic factors we see that these are also high poverty areas. People living in these hotspots have the highest vulnerability to weather related health issues. The data collected in this research was for Richmond, VA. We feel that these conditions exist in most major cities. This viz was developed and published in September.

 Last week The White House released its sweeping National Climate Assessment. The 1,656-page report, compiled by 13 federal agencies and more than 300 researchers, painted the bleakest portrait of the future United States yet.

Learn more about our data solutions here.

The big day has arrived! The kick off of the Culture:SHIFT program.  The planning stages for this transformational multi-year program and journey began in 2017 when the Arts + Business Council and Vereti sat down to discuss what happens when analytical thinking, creative thinking and data are triangulated. The results are evident. Over the past few months, we built strategic partnerships and designed and developed a model program to help organizations in the non profit sector shift to data-driven organizations, where data is part of their culture and data strategy is part of their every day business, and communicating with data is a natural language. This journey starts today!  Thank You from the Arts + Business Council and Vereti to everyone involved, IBM, Comcast, Captech and Data Imprint!