The Analytics X Prize is an ongoing contest to apply analytics, modeling, and statistics to solve the social problems that affect our cities. It combines the fields of statistics, mathematics, and social science to understand the root causes of dysfunction in our neighborhoods. Understanding these relationships and discovering the most highly correlated variables allows us to deploy our limited resources more effectively and target the variables that will have the greatest positive impact on improvement.
Sorta reminds me of The Evelyn Wood Johnson Foundation, (or whatever), advert on NPR. "Underwriting research to find and cure the root cause of homelessness." One suspects it will be a long and inconclusive quest. As the Dutch said while fighting the Spanish: "It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."
