Data Science for Social Good

What Data Science for Social Good does

Data Science for Social Good (DSSG) is a non-profit fellowship program founded in 2013 at the University of Chicago that trains aspiring data scientists through hands-on machine learning, AI, and data science projects delivered to government and nonprofit partners. The program operates a structured summer-fellowship model in which cohorts of fellows work under faculty and practitioner mentorship to build production-grade analytics — spanning computer vision, NLP, predictive modeling, and recommendation systems — for public-interest use cases. Notable deployments include a diabetes-risk model for AllianceChicago covering a 2 million-patient population, a traffic-accident prediction system for Rijkswaterstaat demonstrating a 3-4x improvement, and call-routing analytics for the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline. All project code is released as open source on GitHub, and the program is led by Rayid Ghani as Director and Chief Data Scientist.

DSSG's business model is grant- and donation-funded rather than revenue-generating: the fellowship is free for both fellows and project partners, with operating costs underwritten by university hosts, government grants, and charitable contributions from institutional funders including the Sloan Foundation and Schmidt Sciences. The program has expanded from its University of Chicago origin to additional host universities — Carnegie Mellon in 2022 and Johns Hopkins in 2026 — and has been internationalized through DSSG Europe, which operates across Portugal, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Italy, and Croatia under co-founder Paul van der Boor. Recent cohort sizes have trended smaller (24 fellows in 2022; 15 in 2026), suggesting tighter selectivity rather than aggressive scale-up.

The organization's competitive position rests on three reinforcing assets: a selective talent funnel into applied ML for social impact, a published portfolio of real-world AI deployments that function as reusable methodological proof, and a growing cross-border alumni network across more than 40 countries. These assets are embedded within university partnerships that provide academic legitimacy, faculty mentorship, and student pipelines, but they also leave the program structurally dependent on a narrow set of institutional funders and host universities for continued operation.

Name

Data Science for Social Good

Legal name

Data Science for Social Good Foundation

Website

https://dssgfellowship.org

Company type

Private

Founded year

2013

Operating status

Operating

Short description

Non-profit fellowship program that trains aspiring data scientists to build machine learning and AI solutions for government and nonprofit partners; funded by universities, grants, and charitable donations; operates cohorts across the US and Europe.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Social Impact Data Science Fellowship

NAICS

Research and Development in the Social Sciences and Humanities (54172), Research and Development in the Physical, Engineering, and Life Sciences (54171)

SIC

Services-Computer Programming Services (7371), Services-Social Services (8300)

akta.pro primary industry

Data Science & Analytics Learning Platforms (EDAFANAG)

akta.pro secondary industry

Data Science & Analytics (Data Literacy, SQL, Visualization) (EDAMACAF)

Keywords

• Data science fellowship
• Social impact analytics
• Machine learning training
• Nonprofit data consulting
• Predictive analytics research

Headquarters

HQ city

Pittsburgh

HQ country

United States

HQ region

North America

Offices5 records

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Operations, Technology or R&D, Marketing or Sales, Others

Revenue model

1. Institutional Funding and Donations: The fellowship is supported by universities (Carnegie Mellon, Johns Hopkins, Nova SBE), government grants, and charitable donations. Contact email is [email protected] for donations.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels3 records

Marketing channels7 records

Core offering

Data Science for Social Good operates a full-time summer fellowship program that trains aspiring data scientists to work on machine learning, data science, and AI projects with social impact. Working closely with governments and nonprofits, fellows take on real-world problems in education, health, criminal justice, sustainability, public safety, workforce development, human services, transportation, economic development, and international development. The fellowship runs annually at rotating university hosting locations and produces open-source tools and code libraries from its projects.

Product overview

The Data Science for Social Good Fellowship is a fellowship/training program rather than a traditional software product. It operates as a single unified program consisting of the DSSG Summer Fellowship (running at Johns Hopkins University in 2026, previously at Carnegie Mellon) and DSSG Europe (run in partnership with Nova School of Business and Economics in Cascais, Portugal). The program trains aspiring data scientists through hands-on projects with social impact, working closely with governments and nonprofits. Project areas span education, health, criminal justice, sustainability, public safety, transportation, economic development, international development, and more. The fellowship produces open-source tools and code libraries from its projects, including the hitchhiker's guide training materials and various project-specific repositories hosted on GitHub. For three months, fellows apply data science, analytical, and coding skills in a fast-paced collaborative environment under guidance from full-time mentors and project managers.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• Data Science for Social Good Summer Fellowship Full-time summer program that trains aspiring data scientists to work on machine learning, data science, and AI projects with social impact. Fellows collaborate with governments and nonprofits on real-world problems in education, health, criminal justice, sustainability, public safety, transportation, economic development, international development, and more. Runs annually at rotating university hosting locations (2026 at Johns Hopkins University with 15 fellows and four city project partners).
• DSSG Europe Summer Fellowship Annual European branch of the fellowship, organized in collaboration with Nova School of Business and Economics. Trains aspiring data scientists on social impact projects with European government and nonprofit partners. Held in Cascais/Lisbon, Portugal with cohorts of approximately 15 fellows.
• Open Source Tools and Code Libraries Publicly available code repositories and tools developed during fellowship projects, including the hitchhiker's guide training materials and project-specific repositories for reproducibility and community benefit.

Quantifiable outcome

• 3 to 4 times improvement over baseline in accident prediction models for Rijkswaterstaat
• +3 more outcomes

Named customers10 records

Segments2 records

Ideal customer profiles2 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

AI capability25 records

Feature4 records

Partnerships

Ten partnerships are on record, tiered flagship, core, minor and major.

• Johns Hopkins UniversityflagshipStrategic or Co-development Partner · 1 January 2026Johns Hopkins University is the hosting institution for the 2026 DSSG Summer Fellowship program in Baltimore. Provides venue, infrastructure, and academic support for the 15 fellows working with four city project partners.
• Carnegie Mellon UniversitycoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerCarnegie Mellon University hosted the 2022 DSSG program after COVID-19 break. Historical partner institution where the program was run in recent years.
• Nova School of Business and Economics (Nova SBE)coreStrategic or Co-development PartnerNova SBE organizes the DSSG Europe Summer Fellowship in collaboration with University of Chicago. Hosted European programs in 2017-2018 at Campus Campolide, Lisbon, Portugal.
• Municipality of CascaisminorStrategic or Co-development PartnerThe Municipality of Cascais is a generous supporter of the DSSG Europe Summer Fellowship program, providing funding and local support for the European program.
• Data Science for Social Good FoundationcoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerThe foundation co-runs the DSSG Fellowship program alongside Carnegie Mellon University. Copyright holder for the program (2021 Data Science for Social Good Foundation).
• Rijkswaterstaat (Netherlands Ministry of Water and Infrastructure Management)majorStrategic or Co-development PartnerRijkswaterstaat is a government project partner working on predicting road accidents on Netherlands highways. Operates a 24-hour incident management service to ensure safety and mobility of emergency response workers.
• AllianceChicagomajorStrategic or Co-development PartnerAllianceChicago is a national network of 44 community health centers serving least resourced communities. Partnered on diabetes risk identification project affecting up to 2 million patients.
• Vibrant Emotional HealthmajorStrategic or Co-development PartnerAdministrator of the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, receiving 2.4 million calls annually. Partnered on improving call routing logic to reduce wait times and call abandonment.
• CochranemajorStrategic or Co-development PartnerCochrane is a not-for-profit organization creating systematic reviews of healthcare interventions. Partnered on increasing efficiency of meta-review creation using data science.
• Allegheny County Department of Human ServicesmajorStrategic or Co-development PartnerPartnered on prioritizing rental assistance distribution to prevent homelessness with approximately $3M budget against 15,000 annual evictions.

Scale indicators6 records

Recent moves7 records

Expansion highlights4 records

Direct peers

• The GovLab: The GovLab at NYU operates research and training programs focused on using data and technology to improve governance, overlapping with DSSG's academic-hosted, applied-research model for public-sector data science.
• Bayes Impact: Bayes Impact is a nonprofit that trains data scientists to build public-interest data products, with a fellowship model closely paralleling DSSG's structure and a similar mission of applying ML to social problems.
• DataKind: DataKind is a nonprofit that pairs data scientists with social impact organizations, operating a near-identical model of pro-bono data science project work and a fellowship-style DataCorps program. It is the most direct functional peer to DSSG in the data-science-for-social-good space.
• Code for America: Code for America runs a civic-tech fellowship that places technologists inside government agencies, sharing DSSG's focus on training early-career technologists to deliver software and data science for governments and nonprofits.

Broad incumbents

• Urban Institute: Urban Institute conducts large-scale applied research on social and economic policy using quantitative methods, serving as a broader incumbent in the same evidence-based, social-impact research space as DSSG.
• New America: New America is a large policy think tank with programs addressing technology, education, and public-sector innovation, making it a broad incumbent whose work overlaps with DSSG's training and policy-applied data science.
• RTI International: RTI International is a large nonprofit research institute that applies data science and analytics to social, health, and policy challenges, providing a broader commercial-scale analog to DSSG's fellowship-driven research model.

Others

• Schmidt Futures: Schmidt Futures is a philanthropic initiative supporting talent and technology for public benefit, including fellowship programs in science and policy, making it a thematic enabler/funder adjacent to DSSG's mission and listed funder.

Regional players

• Civic Innovation Corps: Civic Innovation Corps places fellows in local governments to deliver data and technology projects, structurally similar to DSSG's summer fellowship and targeting the same government-partner segment.

Emerging players

• AI4ALL: AI4ALL runs fellowship-style programs that train emerging talent in AI with an equity and inclusion focus, comparable to DSSG's fellowship format but oriented more broadly toward AI education rather than social-impact project delivery.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat5 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• Xx.com/datascifellows
• GitHubgithub.com/dssg
• YouTubeyoutube.com/channel/UCBpKpvEyehOSndy3wpAg_1w

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles2 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

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M&A

Investments

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Frequently asked questions about Data Science for Social Good