Introducing the North Arrow Research Lab
When a budget vote, a new federal rule or a fresh Census release makes the news, the organizations closest to the community are often the first to be asked what it means. Board members want to understand how it affects the people you serve, funders want context for their next round of decisions, and coalition partners need reliable numbers for meetings with elected officials.
The data that could answer these questions usually exists, but it tends to be spread across several agency websites and published in formats that take time and technical skill to work with, which most teams simply don’t have to spare.
That’s the gap we want to address with the North Arrow Research Lab.
What the Research Lab is
The Research Lab is North Arrow’s new public research initiative. Through it, we’ll regularly publish free data pieces connected to policy debates happening right now, from Washington to state capitals to city councils. Some pieces will be interactive maps or lookup tools that let you explore the data for your own area, and others will be short written analyses that walk through what the numbers show and why they matter.
We’re starting with the issues our partners work on every day, including food assistance, health coverage, housing, childcare and education.
What you can expect from each piece
Every piece is designed to be practical and easy to put to use in your own work. Each one will include:
A clear question with findings you can use: each piece is tied to a real decision, so you can see right away what is being decided and how it affects your community. The key findings are given in numbers you can bring into a board presentation, a grant report or a conversation with a legislator.
Maps and data you can explore: maps show where a policy is likely to have the greatest effect, down to the neighborhood or ZIP code where the data allows. A table view and CSV download are there for teams who want to dig deeper.
Context and next steps: a plain-language methods note explains where the numbers come from and what the data can and cannot tell us. Each piece also suggests next steps, including who is making the decision, when it is expected and what questions are worth asking.
Why we’re doing this
Over the past three years, we’ve worked with more than 40 nonprofits and foundations to build map-based dashboards and interactive impact stories. Along the way, we’ve learned a great deal about which data matters most to mission-driven organizations, where to find it and how to present it so that it supports real decisions. The Research Lab is our way of sharing that knowledge more widely, so that organizations beyond those we partner with directly can benefit from it too.
This work also feels especially timely. As federal data collection is cut back and reshaped, free and reliable local data is becoming harder to find, and we hope the Research Lab can help fill some of that gap.
Who’s behind it
The Research Lab is a North Arrow project, supported by graduate students from the University of Pennsylvania’s Master of Science in Social Policy (MSSP) practicum program. The students bring policy research and data analysis skills, and our team brings its mapping tools and years of experience working alongside nonprofits.
Our first projects are already well underway, and we look forward to sharing them with you soon!
Help shape what we cover
If there is a decision coming up in your city or state that you wish you had better data on, we would love to hear about it. We choose topics based on what is being debated now and where a map or analysis can add something new, and we know the most useful ideas often come from the people closest to the work.
You can get in touch through our website, and subscribe to our newsletter to be notified when new pieces are published.
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