Between 2021 and 2022, the Colorado Department of Early Childhood (CDEC) received over $700 million in state and federal stimulus funding to strengthen and expand the early childhood sector in Colorado and support families and the workforce to ensure all children have access to high-quality child care. CDEC has partnered with the Colorado Evaluation and Action Lab (Colorado Lab) at the University of Denver to serve as the early childhood evaluation hub for this stimulus funding. As part of this effort, the Colorado Lab is accepting Letters of Interest from teams interested in receiving funding to develop an external-facing data dashboard.
The purpose of this dashboard is to demonstrate the reach of stimulus funds and changes in key early childhood metrics during this time period to provide justification for future priorities and investments. This work will:
- Provide CDEC with a comprehensive picture of early childhood stimulus funding across the state;
- Show the overlap in funding by groups of interest such as counties/communities and types of early childhood programs, professionals, and supporting organizations;
- Identify gaps in uptake or access to stimulus funding; and
- Showcase early childhood metrics related to the stimulus-funded activities such as changes in licensed capacity, new programs launched, quality rating changes, enrollment figures in licensed programs, and retention and recruitment rates among early childhood professionals.
The Colorado Lab will lead this project and support the developer’s work by:
- Identifying key metrics
- Performing data inventory and mapping
- Developing an analytic plan
- Gathering and cleaning data
- Analyzing data and creating a methodological plan
- Producing underlying tables for the dashboard
- Liaising with CDEC partners
The selected dashboard developer will:
- Gather and document business requirements and technical specifications to guide dashboard development
- Conceptualize and build dashboard shell in Tableau, ensuring compatibility with CDEC systems
- Develop user-friendly interface and design dynamic data visualizations, including maps, to show reach, overlaps, and gaps in distribution of stimulus funds and key metrics
- Populate dashboard with prepared data tables to display key metrics and visualizations
- Perform user testing and complete multiple rounds of revisions based on user feedback
- Develop and lead user training and create user manuals for future reference
This project will be supported by stimulus funds. Work will begin in May 2023 and must be completed by September 2024 with a budget of up to $160,000.
If interested, please complete the Call for External Research Partners questionnaire and submit a letter of interest. Letters of interest should be no longer than two pages and submitted to Val@coloradolab.org no later than end of day Tuesday, April 25, 2023. Letters should include:
- Approach: Describe your team’s high-level approach to developing a dashboard, highlighting your previous experiences implementing such approaches.
- Team: Provide a brief description of relevant qualifications and experiences of the project team leads, and how the team is well-positioned to execute the proposed project. Also identify any anticipated support that will be needed from the Colorado Lab to complete this work.
- Timeline & Cost: Briefly comment on the feasibility of completing this analysis work within the anticipated timeline and budget. A detailed scope of work with specific deliverables and budget will be requested should your team be selected for this opportunity.