We’re participating in the “Open Data Unleashed” session at the OpenGovDC conference on June 14 are are looking forward to talking practically about what it means for government agencies to open up their data. Releasing data sets publicly has gone from being a good tenant of a transparent government to something that all agencies are encouraged to do under the Open Government Initiative. But releasing data publicly requires some legwork in preparing the data, verifying it, and publishing it in a format that’s easy to use.

In this session, we’ll talk about helping the World Bank open up its data catalog of over 7,000 indicators and opening up vote counts from elections in Afghanistan. We’ll also share our perspective on how to release government data so it’s best positioned for use by the public and private sector, for use in apps, maps, and other resources, based on our years of experience doing this ourselves and with our partners.

We’ll be joined on the panel by Tom Lee from the Sunlight Foundation, who are leaders in advocating for and releasing open data, and two people who have led open data projects on the organization side. Jason Hoekstra from the Department of Education will talk about open data at the agency and their recent project mapping schools and their access to broadband internet, and Jenny Cohen from the New America Foundation will talk about about her efforts to release large data sets on the performance of our nation’s schools — and possibly unveil a new website showcasing this data.

OpenGovDC is a one day conference that looks at how open source tools can be used to advance open government. In addition to open data, the conference will look at sharing technology across agencies, mapping data and other information, and security for open source, sharing real life examples of each in government. OpenGovDC is taking place Tuesday, June 14 in downtown Washington, DC. More information, including the full schedule is available at OpenGovDc.com. Tickets are going fast, so we recommend you register today.