The Prosecutorial Data Collaborative
In the interest of cultivating a one-stop shop for such services and supports for a broader range of offices, CUNY ISLG partnered with the Prosecutorial Performance Indicators in early 2024 to launch the Prosecutorial Data Collaborative (Collaborative).
The Collaborative model builds on the success of the PPIs, which are tools that can assist prosecutors manage offices, assess performance, and ensure that the office’s practices align with the goal and policies set forth by leadership and staff. CUNY ISLG then builds off data points uncovered by the PPI tools, providing complementary in-depth analytic work in specific areas in which a participating office has identified issues and/or wants to enhance policy and practice, and by offering infrastructural improvements to further enhance data and analytic capacity over time.
The Collaborative is flexible, adaptable, and grounded in the needs and goals of partnership offices. Bringing together a team of data scientists, researchers, and practitioners, the Collaborative supports offices in building the infrastructure and culture necessary to not only effectively use data in their offices, courtrooms, and communities to support decision-making and policy, but to enable compliance with broader statutory requirements that may impact the work of prosecutors, (e.g., legislative changes to data and reporting).
The Collaborative also facilitates the unique opportunity to match each participating office with a local research or academic partner or fellow that can provide ongoing data and analytic support, helping sustain changes over time. Offices also have access to a network of peers.
This work is currently being funded by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation and Microsoft’s Justice Reform Initiative. Through that funding, we are able to offer offices two years of hands-on assistance from our team—participating offices are not required to financially contribute toward any of the services that are provided.
For more on the Prosecutorial Data Collaborative and our prosecution work more broadly, see the Transparency and Data in Prosecution case study page.