Tag Archives: google.org

How AI helps volunteers support LGBTQ youth in crisis

Over 1.8 million LGBTQ youth seriously consider suicide in the U.S. each year. At The Trevor Project, an organization that provides crisis intervention and suicide prevention services to LGBTQ youth, the number of youth reaching out for support has ballooned since the start of the pandemic — at times nearly doubling our pre-COVID-19 volume. We knew we needed to train more volunteer crisis counselors to meet the growing demand for mental health support — and do so while working fully remote. The ability to connect the youth that we serve with highly trained counselors 24/7 is life-saving work, and will always hinge on human connection.


Over the last two years, Google.org has provided $2.7 million in funding and a team of nearly 30 Google.org Fellows to help scale The Trevor Project’s LGBTQ+ youth crisis support resources and technology using AI and machine learning. Most recently, Trevor and a team of Fellows built the Crisis Contact Simulator (CCS), a counselor training tool that uses AI to simulate conversations with LGBTQ youth in crisis. The simulator lets volunteer trainees practice realistic conversations with youth personas, equipping them with the skills needed to provide critical care. With this tool and other training innovations, we plan to grow our team of 700 digital volunteer crisis counselors by 10x! 


To become a volunteer crisis counselor, trainees learn about our counseling support model, active communication skills and LGBTQ identities, and take part in intensive one-on-one, human-led role play scenarios. We needed to build and test a tool that would provide a time-flexible, role-play opportunity for trainees outside of typical business hours — this was especially important since we know that nearly 70% of our digital crisis counselors volunteer on nights and weekends.  


To do so, we worked with the Google.org Fellows to bring together our knowledge and expertise in machine learning and natural language processing, product management, user experience, education, LGBTQ youth, and clinical psychology. "Through my work as a Google.org Fellow, I was able to adapt traditional user experience design practices and identify new ways for designers to collaborate with machine learning engineers. Being embedded with the Trevor project allowed us to be super collaborative with the training team as well, and gave us the opportunity to build lasting frameworks for their future AI work." said Abby Beck, a UX Design Lead at Google. 

Thanks to six months of rigorous research, feedback, evaluations and data collected from thousands of role-play transcripts between the training team and volunteers, the CCS can emulate a number of digital youth personas. This allows trainees to practice realistic conversations with a wide range of life situations, risk levels and intersectional identities that span race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender identity, and more. "Riley," the first digital youth persona, emulates a young person who’s struggling to come out as genderqueer. As more digital youth personas are introduced into the training program, Trevor counselors will become more adept at providing high-quality care and support to young people experiencing a variety of crises. 

Animated image of the Crisis Contact Simulator during a training session with a Trevor Project volunteer counselor.

A Trevor Project crisis counselor trainee interacts with “Riley,” one of the Crisis Contact Simulator personas who’s struggling to come out as genderqueer.

As we think about automating more training models, we wanted our training team to be able to evaluate the CCS tool. We created a human evaluation rubric that allows folks on our team to have a conversation with the CCS and rate if it’s being sensible, specific and authentic and if it’s achieving the intended learning objective. 

So far, an initial cohort of Trevor Project staff has been trained as crisis counselors using this tool, and we’ve started using it in our broader training curriculum. It’s easy to see why we’re excited to celebrate today’s launch of the Crisis Contact Simulator: the hard work was all in service of increasing the number of LGBTQ youth that we can help. It’s our goal that LGBTQ youth can always speak to a highly-trained crisis counselor — for free and 24/7 — and technology like AI can help us train even more volunteers to meet that goal. If you or someone you know needs help or support, contact The Trevor Project at TheTrevorProject.org/Help. 


Reimagining 311 for the City of San José

Editor’s Note: Today marks the second annual National 311 Day. We talked with the City of San José’s CTO to learn about how they worked with Google.org Fellows to connect residents to the information they needed. 

National 311 Day is a day to remind communities nationwide to use 311, a resource to connect with their city’s non-emergency services. It’s an important tool that cities use to unburden 911 call-takers of non-emergency calls, allowing them to quickly respond to residents’ most urgent needs. It’s also a time to honor the hardworking call-takers, especially after the past year as they’ve worked tirelessly to connect millions of local residents to critical services during the COVID-19 pandemic. We like to say that 911 is for the burning building, and 311 is for the burning questions, like the latest information about COVID-19, who provides garbage and recycling services or how to report a water leak.

At the beginning of 2019 San José identified a clear problem: it was taking too long for first responders to answer 911 calls. The State of California requires that 95% of 911 calls be answered within 15 seconds, and San José fell short of this goal in 2017 and 2018. That’s when we reached out to Google for help and were selected for a Google.org Fellowship. Together, we worked with a team of pro bono full-time Google.org Fellows to reduce 911 and 311 response times, improve the customer service experience, make 311 more accessible to residents, and address the growing load on call centers with solutions like a machine learning-based virtual agent.

First, the Google.org Fellows talked to residents and analyzed call volumes to understand what was contributing to the issues. They shadowed over 60 hours of calls to identify the most impactful ways to improve the response time, how to educate residents about 311 services, and ways to make it accessible to the residents of San José. San José is also one the most diverse U.S. cities, with residents speaking more than 100 languages. This demanded a new approach to automating the intake of requests from a majority population whose first language is not English, so equitable access was also top of mind for the Google.org Fellows. 


San José Mayor Sam Liccardo alongside other city officials and representatives from Google celebrating the inaugural National 311 Day last year. Photo credit: Jennifer Leahy Photography

 San José Mayor Sam Liccardo alongside other city officials and representatives from Google celebrating the inaugural National 311 Day last year. Photo credit: Jennifer Leahy Photography 


At the end of the six month Fellowship, the City’s 311 system was more inclusive and efficient. This was especially helpful as COVID-19 began to affect our community, making fast and reliable emergency and non-emergency responses for our residents even more essential. Since then, we’ve continued to see improvements to our 311 services:

  • Improved customer and call-taker experience: 311 is handling 30,000 additional calls per year that were previously routed through the police non-emergency call center. Directing these calls to 311 has resulted in a better allocation of resources and a more efficient customer and call-taker experience.
  • More ways to connect: The channels available to residents have expanded to include a virtual agent and a chatbot in addition to improvements to the web portal, mobile app and more.
  • Increased language support: Translation services have allowed residents who speak Vietnamese, Spanish, and English to interface with virtual agents and the mobile app, which has helped to address digital equity and accessibility issues.

“The improvements the City has made came at the right moment, so that residents could get the critical information they needed in an unprecedented year," says Kent Walker, SVP of Global Affairs for Google. "I also want to thank the 311 call-takers—the “first” first responders who answer these requests every day.”

Thanks to the technical help from Google.org, we’ve been able to respond more quickly to residents and connect them to government services during this critical time. We’re beginning to work with other municipalities across the U.S. to share what we’ve learned in hopes of furthering more equitable citizen services far beyond our city limits. 



Reimagining 311 for the City of San José

Editor’s Note: Today marks the second annual National 311 Day. We talked with the City of San José’s CTO to learn about how they worked with Google.org Fellows to connect residents to the information they needed. 

National 311 Day is a day to remind communities nationwide to use 311, a resource to connect with their city’s non-emergency services. It’s an important tool that cities use to unburden 911 call-takers of non-emergency calls, allowing them to quickly respond to residents’ most urgent needs. It’s also a time to honor the hardworking call-takers, especially after the past year as they’ve worked tirelessly to connect millions of local residents to critical services during the COVID-19 pandemic. We like to say that 911 is for the burning building, and 311 is for the burning questions, like the latest information about COVID-19, who provides garbage and recycling services or how to report a water leak.

At the beginning of 2019 San José identified a clear problem: it was taking too long for first responders to answer 911 calls. The State of California requires that 95% of 911 calls be answered within 15 seconds, and San José fell short of this goal in 2017 and 2018. That’s when we reached out to Google for help and were selected for a Google.org Fellowship. Together, we worked with a team of pro bono full-time Google.org Fellows to reduce 911 and 311 response times, improve the customer service experience, make 311 more accessible to residents, and address the growing load on call centers with solutions like a machine learning-based virtual agent.

First, the Google.org Fellows talked to residents and analyzed call volumes to understand what was contributing to the issues. They shadowed over 60 hours of calls to identify the most impactful ways to improve the response time, how to educate residents about 311 services, and ways to make it accessible to the residents of San José. San José is also one the most diverse U.S. cities, with residents speaking more than 100 languages. This demanded a new approach to automating the intake of requests from a majority population whose first language is not English, so equitable access was also top of mind for the Google.org Fellows. 


San José Mayor Sam Liccardo alongside other city officials and representatives from Google celebrating the inaugural National 311 Day last year. Photo credit: Jennifer Leahy Photography

 San José Mayor Sam Liccardo alongside other city officials and representatives from Google celebrating the inaugural National 311 Day last year. Photo credit: Jennifer Leahy Photography 


At the end of the six month Fellowship, the City’s 311 system was more inclusive and efficient. This was especially helpful as COVID-19 began to affect our community, making fast and reliable emergency and non-emergency responses for our residents even more essential. Since then, we’ve continued to see improvements to our 311 services:

  • Improved customer and call-taker experience: 311 is handling 30,000 additional calls per year that were previously routed through the police non-emergency call center. Directing these calls to 311 has resulted in a better allocation of resources and a more efficient customer and call-taker experience.
  • More ways to connect: The channels available to residents have expanded to include a virtual agent and a chatbot in addition to improvements to the web portal, mobile app and more.
  • Increased language support: Translation services have allowed residents who speak Vietnamese, Spanish, and English to interface with virtual agents and the mobile app, which has helped to address digital equity and accessibility issues.

“The improvements the City has made came at the right moment, so that residents could get the critical information they needed in an unprecedented year," says Kent Walker, SVP of Global Affairs for Google. "I also want to thank the 311 call-takers—the “first” first responders who answer these requests every day.”

Thanks to the technical help from Google.org, we’ve been able to respond more quickly to residents and connect them to government services during this critical time. We’re beginning to work with other municipalities across the U.S. to share what we’ve learned in hopes of furthering more equitable citizen services far beyond our city limits. 



Job-training solutions in Europe, the Middle East and Africa

As the pandemic accelerates changes in how and where we work, many of us will need to upgrade our skills or even change careers. Today we’re announcing more help, in partnership with expert organizations and with the public sector, building on our experience in training over 17 million people in Europe, the Middle East and Africa over the last six years through Grow with Google.

Even before COVID-19, research by Google and McKinsey showed that more than 90 million European workers may need to develop significant new skills within their current roles, while up to 21 million may have to leave occupations with declining labor needs like agriculture or in-person retail. The global crisis has sped up many of these predicted changes: McKinsey now estimates that 25% more people in Europe may need to transition to new jobs after the pandemic. Many people will need to learn new skills, as almost all growth in labor demand will continue to be for higher skill, higher wage jobs. 

Today, we are announcing three new Google Career Certificates available online on Coursera, which enable people to become job-ready for growing career areas such as IT Support, Project Management, UX Design and Data Analytics. These low-cost programs help people who want to learn online at their own pace, or who may want to change careers and don't have the time or means to access traditional education. They can be completed in under six months, do not require relevant experience or a degree, and are recognized by industry experts and employers. 

These certificates help meet surging demand by workers to get the skills they need to secure good jobs. At the start of the lockdowns, we saw atripling of demandfor online learning, and the interest has been mostly sustained throughout the year, as people need to find new jobs or learn new skills that employers are looking for today — and in the years ahead.

These certificates help meet surging demand by workers to get the skills they need to secure good jobs. In the last year, we've seen increased interest in online learning as more workers lose their jobs or as they seek the skills employers are looking for today — and in the years ahead.

Addressing the challenges of the future of work requires collaboration between governments, companies and community organizations. We are proud to support the European Commission’s Pact for Skills, and, as part of our commitment to help people overcome barriers to learning, we will provide scholarships for the certificates for 100,000 people in EMEA. Scholarships will be distributed through local organizations like Fundae and SEPE in Spain, APDC and IEFP in Portugal, the London Borough of Camden in the UK, OAED in Greece, Czechitas in Czech Republic and Slovakia, the Agency for Digital Development (ADD) in Morocco and RootHub in Nigeria. Additional local collaborations will be announced soon. 

We’re also focused on ways to address gender and economic inequalities, which have been further widened by the pandemic. Underrepresented groups, low-income workers and women are more exposed to hard-hit sectors, like food service or hospitality, and are therefore more at risk of losing their jobs. Older workers without computer experience also face unique challenges as they struggle more to get back into work. Google.org will allocate 50,000 of these scholarships for people from underserved communities, providing access to people from all backgrounds.

Google.org through an initial €5 million grant to INCO, a global nonprofit organisation, will work with over 50 local nonprofits to provide services like career advice, interview preparation, childcare vouchers and language support. These organisations include Riga Tech Girls, a woman-led nonprofit in Latvia that will distribute scholarships to underprivileged women to help get more women into tech jobs.

While there are people that cannot find a job because they don't have the right skills, 40% of employers in Europe also struggled to find qualified people. Joining policy efforts led by the European Commission and others to help bridge the skills gap between employers and workers, we’re committed to gathering companies and organizations who, like us, recognize the Google Career Certificates and openly express their interest in receiving applications from graduates. Certificate graduates can also apply for our apprenticeship programs. 

Technology must help everyone, no matter their location, race, age or education level. Governments and companies must rethink how we equip people with new skills by removing barriers to learning and investing in innovative partnerships — otherwise these inequalities will only grow.  We hope that with these new efforts and the support of our public sector partners, even more people can develop the skills to thrive and continue growing their careers through technology.

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Google.org’s call for a better future for women and girls

When women and girls have the resources and opportunities to turn their potential into power, it changes the trajectory of their lives and strengthens entire communities. I’ve seen this play out first hand while living in India, where public health programs that put resources and decision-making in the hands of women drove much stronger outcomes for their families and villages. I’ve seen this in my own life, when bosses — both male and female — gave me stretch opportunities and bet on my leadership. 


This is why I was excited to join our CEO Sundar Pichai to launch our globalGoogle.org Impact Challenge for Women and Girls at a Google for India Women Will event earlier this morning. We’re calling on ideas from nonprofits and social organizations around the world that are working to advance the economic empowerment of women and girls and create pathways to prosperity. Google.org will provide $25 million in overall funding and Impact Challenge grantees will receive mentoring from Googlers, Ad Grants and additional support to bring their ideas to life.


Since I started working in philanthropy over 20 years ago, I’ve seen women and girls around the world reach new heights and was thrilled when the United Nations made “gender equality and empowerment of all women and girls” one of its Sustainable Development Goals back in 2015. Still, women and men remain on unequal footing — and these inequalities have worsened in the wake of COVID-19. Globally, women are almost two times more likely to lose their jobs as a result of COVID-19, and in the U.S. alone women have lost over 5.4 million jobs, accounting for 55% of all 2020 net job losses. Women are also shouldering a disproportionate amount of unpaid domestic work, and an estimated 20 million girls around the world are at risk of not returning to school. Job cuts, income loss and lack of access to education will prevent the economic advancement of women and girls, particularly those from underserved communities, for generations to come. 


These alarming realities require swift and powerful action. We have a collective responsibility to make sure that generations of women and girls from all walks of life can live in a world where they are treated equally and reach their full potential. Over the last five years, Google.org has given more than $55 million to nonprofit organizations that support gender equity and access to opportunity for women and girls around the world. We’ve also worked with grantees, such as the National Domestic Workers Alliance, Laboratoria and GiveDirectly, that are dedicated to the same cause. This new Impact Challenge will build on that work.  


I’m honored to stand alongside our partners fromVital Voices andProject Everyone, as well as our phenomenal panel of experts, to elevate the critical work that is happening around the world. Our panel is composed of women leaders from more than 15 countries with a deep expertise in global public policy, advocacy, research, business, technology and more. They will help guide us as we select the ideas with the greatest potential for impact. 


  • Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls expert panel includes: Ai-Jen Poo: Director, National Domestic Workers Alliance, Caring Across Generations; Alyse Nelson: Co-Founder, President & CEO of Vital Voices Global Partnership; Amanda Gorman: Poet, Activist, & Author; Amika Geroge,: Student, Activist & Founder of Free Periods

    2021 Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls Expert Panel


  • Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls expert panel includes: Carolyn Tastad: Group President – North America & Executive Sponsor Gender Equality, P&G; Dr. Fabiola Gianotti: Director-General of CERN; Dr. Rigoberta Menchú ​​Tum: Nobel Peace Prize 1992; Prajakta Koli, YouTuber & Actor

    2021 Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls Expert Panel


  • Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls expert panel includes: Graça Fonseca: Minister of Culture for Portugal; Graça Machel: Founder, Graça Machel Trust; Her Excellency, (DR) Adejoke Orelope-Adefulire: Senior Special Assistant to the President on SDGs; Hon Rona Ambrose: Deputy Chairwoman, TD Securities

    2021 Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls Expert Panel


  • Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls expert panel includes: Jacquelline Fuller: VP and President, Google.org; Julia Kata: Vice President of Trans-Fuzja Foundation; Juliana Rotich: VP Strategic Partnerships, Boya Ltd Co-Founder, Ushahidi, BRCK; Kate Garvey: Co-found, Project Everyone

    2021 Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls Expert Panel


  • Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls expert panel includes: Laura Berry: Chief Executive Officer, Supply Nation; Lisa Mensah: President & Chief Executive Officer Opportunity Finance Network; Lorraine Twohill: Senior Vice President, Global Marketing, Google; Mary Robinson: Former President of Ireland and UN High Commissioner for Human Rights

    2021 Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls Expert Panel


  • Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls expert panel includes: Melonie Parker: Chief Diversity Officer, Google; Naomi Osaka: Athlete and Activist; Natalia Vodianova: Supermodel, Philanthropist, Impact investor and UNFPA Goodwill Ambassador; Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka: United Nations Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director of UN Women

    2021 Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls Expert Panel


  • Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls expert panel includes: Saskia Niño de Rivera- Co-founder & Spokeperson of Reinserta A.C.; Shakira: Global Artist and Philanthropist; Susan Wojcicki: CEO YouTube; Taís Araújo: Actress, TV Host and Champion of Black Women's Rights for UNWomen Brazil

    2021 Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls Expert Panel


If you’re working on an innovative project that supports women and girls, or have a bold idea that will transform economic opportunities for women and girls, then check out g.co/womenandgirlschallenge to apply and learn more about the Challenge. Organizations have until Friday, April 9 to submit ideas, and grant recipients will be announced later this year.


Google.org’s call for a better future for women and girls

When women and girls have the resources and opportunities to turn their potential into power, it changes the trajectory of their lives and strengthens entire communities. I’ve seen this play out first hand while living in India, where public health programs that put resources and decision-making in the hands of women drove much stronger outcomes for their families and villages. I’ve seen this in my own life, when bosses — both male and female — gave me stretch opportunities and bet on my leadership. 


This is why I was excited to join our CEO Sundar Pichai to launch our globalGoogle.org Impact Challenge for Women and Girls at a Google for India Women Will event earlier this morning. We’re calling on ideas from nonprofits and social organizations around the world that are working to advance the economic empowerment of women and girls and create pathways to prosperity. Google.org will provide $25 million in overall funding and Impact Challenge grantees will receive mentoring from Googlers, Ad Grants and additional support to bring their ideas to life.


Since I started working in philanthropy over 20 years ago, I’ve seen women and girls around the world reach new heights and was thrilled when the United Nations made “gender equality and empowerment of all women and girls” one of its Sustainable Development Goals back in 2015. Still, women and men remain on unequal footing — and these inequalities have worsened in the wake of COVID-19. Globally, women are almost two times more likely to lose their jobs as a result of COVID-19, and in the U.S. alone women have lost over 5.4 million jobs, accounting for 55% of all 2020 net job losses. Women are also shouldering a disproportionate amount of unpaid domestic work, and an estimated 20 million girls around the world are at risk of not returning to school. Job cuts, income loss and lack of access to education will prevent the economic advancement of women and girls, particularly those from underserved communities, for generations to come. 


These alarming realities require swift and powerful action. We have a collective responsibility to make sure that generations of women and girls from all walks of life can live in a world where they are treated equally and reach their full potential. Over the last five years, Google.org has given more than $55 million to nonprofit organizations that support gender equity and access to opportunity for women and girls around the world. We’ve also worked with grantees, such as the National Domestic Workers Alliance, Laboratoria and GiveDirectly, that are dedicated to the same cause. This new Impact Challenge will build on that work.  


I’m honored to stand alongside our partners fromVital Voices andProject Everyone, as well as our phenomenal panel of experts, to elevate the critical work that is happening around the world. Our panel is composed of women leaders from more than 15 countries with a deep expertise in global public policy, advocacy, research, business, technology and more. They will help guide us as we select the ideas with the greatest potential for impact. 


  • Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls expert panel includes: Ai-Jen Poo: Director, National Domestic Workers Alliance, Caring Across Generations; Alyse Nelson: Co-Founder, President & CEO of Vital Voices Global Partnership; Amanda Gorman: Poet, Activist, & Author; Amika Geroge,: Student, Activist & Founder of Free Periods

    2021 Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls Expert Panel


  • Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls expert panel includes: Carolyn Tastad: Group President – North America & Executive Sponsor Gender Equality, P&G; Dr. Fabiola Gianotti: Director-General of CERN; Dr. Rigoberta Menchú ​​Tum: Nobel Peace Prize 1992; Prajakta Koli, YouTuber & Actor

    2021 Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls Expert Panel


  • Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls expert panel includes: Graça Fonseca: Minister of Culture for Portugal; Graça Machel: Founder, Graça Machel Trust; Her Excellency, (DR) Adejoke Orelope-Adefulire: Senior Special Assistant to the President on SDGs; Hon Rona Ambrose: Deputy Chairwoman, TD Securities

    2021 Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls Expert Panel


  • Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls expert panel includes: Jacquelline Fuller: VP and President, Google.org; Julia Kata: Vice President of Trans-Fuzja Foundation; Juliana Rotich: VP Strategic Partnerships, Boya Ltd Co-Founder, Ushahidi, BRCK; Kate Garvey: Co-found, Project Everyone

    2021 Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls Expert Panel


  • Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls expert panel includes: Laura Berry: Chief Executive Officer, Supply Nation; Lisa Mensah: President & Chief Executive Officer Opportunity Finance Network; Lorraine Twohill: Senior Vice President, Global Marketing, Google; Mary Robinson: Former President of Ireland and UN High Commissioner for Human Rights

    2021 Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls Expert Panel


  • Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls expert panel includes: Melonie Parker: Chief Diversity Officer, Google; Naomi Osaka: Athlete and Activist; Natalia Vodianova: Supermodel, Philanthropist, Impact investor and UNFPA Goodwill Ambassador; Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka: United Nations Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director of UN Women

    2021 Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls Expert Panel


  • Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls expert panel includes: Saskia Niño de Rivera- Co-founder & Spokeperson of Reinserta A.C.; Shakira: Global Artist and Philanthropist; Susan Wojcicki: CEO YouTube; Taís Araújo: Actress, TV Host and Champion of Black Women's Rights for UNWomen Brazil

    2021 Google.org Impact Challenge for Women & Girls Expert Panel


If you’re working on an innovative project that supports women and girls, or have a bold idea that will transform economic opportunities for women and girls, then check out g.co/womenandgirlschallenge to apply and learn more about the Challenge. Organizations have until Friday, April 9 to submit ideas, and grant recipients will be announced later this year.


WomenWill – Our commitment to support economic empowerment of women in rural India

At Google, we have a longstanding commitment to bring the benefits of the internet to everyone. From 2015 to 2020, over 1.5 billion people across the world came online, and India has been the fastest growing contributor. But connectivity is only foundational, we need to come together to ensure that everyone has the support needed to participate and equal opportunity to gain from these developments.

This belief led us to embark on our most ambitious program till date called the Internet Saathi to help narrow the digital gender divide in India. Today, on the occasion of International Women’s Day, we are delighted to share that, in its six year journey, this joint effort with Tata Trusts has had a cascading impact benefitting over 30 million women across rural India, and contributed to narrowing the digital gender gap in India. The program was designed to impart digital literacy training to women across 300,000 villages in India, and it took the courage and non-stop efforts of over 80,000 women trainers called Internet Saathis to make this possible.

But even as we come together to salute and celebrate the success of these Internet Saathis, we know the progress on gender equity has been uneven, fragile, frustratingly slow, and equality and equal economic empowerment of women is a long way off.  Post COVID-19, job cuts, income loss, and lack of access to education will prevent women and girls' economic advancement, particularly those from underserved communities, for generations to come. These alarming realities require swift and decisive action.

Today, at the virtual edition of Google for India event called Women Will, our CEO, Sundar Pichai, and President of Google.org, Jacquelline Fuller, made a series of announcements in support of the economic empowerment of women, both in India and globally, to create an ecosystem of entrepreneurship enablers to help narrow the gender gap.

Supporting 1 million women entrepreneurs in rural India

Based on learnings from the Internet Saathi program, and to continue to support women in rural India to pursue their ambitions and improve their livelihoods through entrepreneurship, we are introducing a new Women Will web platform. This will be complemented by community support, mentorship, and accelerator programs for rural women entrepreneurs.

Available in English and Hindi, the Women Will platform is designed especially for women aspiring to explore entrepreneurship. Through a “how to” curriculum on turning an interest into a business, managing an enterprise, and promoting it for growth, the platform will provide guidance and support to women who want to convert an existing hobby or talent such as tailoring, beauty services, home tuition, food processing, etc. into some income. To begin with, we will work with 2,000 Internet Saathis to help other women gain from this resource and start on their entrepreneurial journey.

Supporting 100,000 women agri-workers with NASSCOM Foundation in India

To support women with access to skills they need for the future, we are committing $500K in funding to NASSCOM Foundation through our philanthropic arm, Google.org. With this support, they will reach 100,000 women agri workers with digital and financial literacy training in the six states of Bihar, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttarakhand, and Uttar Pradesh.  NASSCOM Foundation will also set up a helpline where women agri workers will be able to call and get further counselling on their entrepreneurship related queries.

US$25 million Google.org Global Impact Challenge for Women & Girls

As we make these commitments in India, we are very conscious that the disruption of 2020 has widened the gender equity gap globally. Post-COVID-19, a future of all-round prosperity is anchored in the guarantee of gender equity, and this requires concerted but bold efforts.

Google.org, which connects nonprofit innovators with the best of Google’s resources, is today launching a global Google.org Impact Challenge for Women and Girls. Under this effort we will provide $25 million in overall funding to nonprofits and social organizations in India and around the world that are working to advance women and girls' economic empowerment and create pathways to prosperity.  Selected Impact Challenge grantees will also receive mentoring from Googlers, Ad Grants, and additional support to bring their ideas to life. Visit g.co/womenandgirlschallenge to learn more about the Challenge and apply by 10 April. 

Feature enablements on Search and Maps for women entrepreneurs   

For many entrepreneurs, Search and Maps are their storefront. In order to make it easier for people to support women-led businesses, Google will enable search in English for “women-led” — “women-led restaurants,” “women-led clothing stores” and more — on Google Search and Maps. This is based on an opt-in feature on Google My Business where women-led businesses can identify as such on their Business Profiles. This will not only enhance the online presence of hundreds of women-owned businesses but customers can easily extend their support by purchasing from them, leaving a great review, and sharing their Business Profile. 

GPay Business Pages for Homepreneurs

To empower homepreneurs, the vast majority of whom are women, Google Pay has announced the launch of Business Pages which enables them to create easy catalogues of their products and services and direct people to them through a unique URL. Interested buyers can chat with the homepreneur about their order and pay within the chat-based interface on Google Pay. 

The success of the Internet Saathi Program has strengthened our belief that the impact of investments behind empowering women and girls is deeply rewarding and has long standing benefits for generations to come. At every level, the costs of exclusion are high, and the advantages of equity are manifold.

And as our CEO Sundar Pichai said, we have the opportunity to build a future that is more equal and more inclusive and we must take it, and we are committed to continuing our journey on this course.

Posted by Sanjay Gupta, Country Head & Vice President, Google India, and Sapna Chadha, Senior Director Marketing, Google India & South East Asia

A Matter of Impact: February updates from Google.org

Editor’s note: Welcome to A Matter of Impact, Google.org’s monthly digest, where we highlight what the team’s been up to and spotlight some of the incredible nonprofits and Google.org Fellows helping solve some of society’s biggest challenges through technology and innovation. 

It didn’t take long for the effects of COVID-19 to reveal a devastating, but predictable, truth: the pandemic has had an outsized impact on marginalized groups, especially people of color. At Google.org, we aim to bring the best of Google to support underserved communities. So when we made a $100 million grant and 50,000 pro bono hour commitment to support COVID-19 relief, we focused our efforts on addressing the compounding racial and social inequities of this crisis. 

As we join forces to fight this pandemic, we must put equity at the center of our response and lift up our most vulnerable communities. Here you’ll find updates about our work that’s at the intersection of COVID-19 relief and equity and two themes that remain top priorities for us.

Equitable distribution of vaccines and health information

Data shows that COVID-19 affects people of color at much higher rates: about 71% percent of Black Americans and 61% of Hispanic Americans know someone who has died or been hospitalized from the virus compared to 48% of white Americans. Yet data also shows that Black Americans are getting vaccinated at lower rates than their peers. That’s why we have a team of Google.org Fellows working full-time with the Satcher Health Leadership Institute at Morehouse School of Medicine to help create a Health Equity Tracker to map and contextualize COVID-19 health disparities in communities of color throughout the U.S. We’re also committing $5 million in grants to organizations addressing racial and geographic disparities in COVID-19 vaccinations.

Support for minority-owned small businesses

Turning to the economy, reports have shown that 41% of Black-owned businesses — about 440,000 businesses — have shuttered due to COVID-19 compared to 17% of businesses owned by white people. To support minority business owners through the pandemic, we’ve supported Common Future with grant funding to provide capital and technical assistance to 2,000 women and minority small-business entrepreneurs in the U.S. We’ll also provide opportunities for Google volunteers to assist them with skill-based coaching and mentoring. 

Read the rest of our Google.org updates below.

In case you missed it 

Yesterday, leading academic organizations with support from a team of Google.org Fellows, shared the launch of Global.health, a data platform that helps model the trajectory of COVID-19 and future disease. Last month, we launched a Google.org Impact Challenge to help bridge the digital divide in Central and Eastern Europe, and announced $3 million in grants to help underserved communities in Kenya during a virtual summit with Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google and Alphabet, and H.E. Uhuru Kenyatta, President of the Republic of Kenya.
Watch this video on YouTube to learn more about the Global.health platform.
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Hear from one of our grantees: Common Future

Rodney Foxworth is the CEO of Common Future, a network of leaders helping to build an economy that includes everyone. Last spring, Common Future received a $5 million Google.org grant to provide capital and technical assistance to women and minority small business entrepreneurs in the U.S. 

Headshot of Rodney Foxworth laughing in front of a red brick wall.

Rodney Foxworth is the CEO of Common Future, a Google.org grantee. 


“As we think about long-term COVID-19 recovery, we need to stabilize and uplift small businesses. Common Future, with support from Google.org, has been able to give grants to over 30 organizations that do just that. These entrepreneurial-support organizations (ESOs) that we supported serve roughly 2,000 small businesses across the U.S. — 76% of these organizations are run by people of color and 62% are run by women — and center on inclusive lending models. For example, a few organizations that we work with are pioneering character-based lending models, as many business-owners of color are excluded from the traditional banking sector due to traditional credit and collateral requirements.”

A few words with a Google.org Fellow: Colin Jackson

Colin Jackson is a product manager who recently completed a Google.org Fellowship with Satcher Health Leadership Institute (SHLI) at Morehouse School of Medicine. 

A headshot of Colin Jackson.

Colin Jackson is a Google.org Fellow with Satcher Health Leadership Institute at Morehouse School of Medicine.

“I grew up Black in America, but I was raised by a white family. This gave me a unique perspective on health inequity. I spent a lot of time in hospitals as a child since my little sister was diagnosed with cancer when she was two years old. In the midst of that pain I very quickly became aware of the different ways I was treated in medical spaces when I was alone compared to when I was with my family. Helping develop SHLI’s Health Equity Tracker was such a natural fit for me, and the experience was deeply rewarding. I felt like I was returning to those hospitals I spent so much time in as a child, but this time with the power to make a difference.”

How anonymized data helps fight against disease

Data has always been a vital tool in understanding and fighting disease — from Florence Nightingale’s 1800s hand drawn illustrations that showed how poor sanitation contributed to preventable diseases to the first open source repository of data developed in response to the 2014 Ebola crisis in West Africa. When the first cases of COVID-19 were reported in Wuhan, data again became one of the most critical tools to combat the pandemic. 

A group of researchers, who documented the initial outbreak, quickly joined forces and started collecting data that could help epidemiologists around the world model the trajectory of the novel coronavirus outbreak. The researchers came from University of Oxford, Tsinghua University, Northeastern University and Boston Children’s Hospital, among others. 

However, their initial workflow was not designed for the exponential rise in cases. The researchers turned to Google.org for help. As part of Google’s $100 million contribution to COVID relief, Google.org granted $1.25 million in funding and provided a team of 10 fulltime Google.org Fellows and 7 part-time Google volunteers to assist with the project.  

Google volunteers worked with the researchers to create Global.health, a scalable and open-access platform that pulls together millions of anonymized COVID-19 cases from over 100 countries. This platform helps epidemiologists around the world model the trajectory of COVID-19, and track its variants and future infectious diseases. 

The need for trusted and anonymized case data

When an outbreak occurs, timely access to organized, trustworthy and anonymized data is critical for public health leaders to inform early policy decisions, medical interventions, and allocations of resources — all of which can slow disease spread and save lives. The insights derived from “line-list” data (e.g. anonymized case level information), as opposed to aggregated data such as case counts, are essential for epidemiologists to perform more detailed statistical analyses and model the effectiveness of interventions. 

Volunteers at the University of Oxford started manually curating this data, but it was spread over hundreds of websites, in dozens of formats, in multiple languages. The HealthMap team at Boston Children’s Hospital also identified early reports of COVID-19 through automated indexing of news sites and official sources. These two teams joined forces, shared the data, and published peer-reviewed findings to create a trusted resource for the global community.

Enter the Google.org Fellowship

To help the global community of researchers in this meaningful endeavour, Google.org decided to offer the support of 10 Google.org Fellows who spent 6 months working full-time on Global.health, in addition to $1.25M in grant funding. Working hand in hand with the University of Oxford and Boston Children’s Hospital, the Google.org team spoke to researchers and public health officials working on the frontline to understand real-life challenges they faced when finding and using high-quality trusted data — a tedious and manual process that often takes hours. 

Upholding data privacy is key to the platform’s design. The anonymized data used at Global.health comes from open-access authoritative public health sources, and a panel of data experts rigorously checks it to make sure it meets strict anonymity requirements. The Google.org Fellows assisted the Global.health team to design the data ingestion flow to implement best practices for data verification and quality checks to make sure that no personal data made its way into the platform. (All line-list data added to the platform is stored and hosted in Boston Children’s Hospital’s secure data infrastructure, not Google’s.)

Looking to the future

With the support of Google.org and The Rockefeller Foundation, Global.health has grown into an international consortium of researchers at leading universities curating the most comprehensive line-list COVID-19 database in the world.  It includes millions of anonymized records from trusted sources spanning over 100 countries, including India.

Today, Global.health helps researchers across the globe access data in a matter of minutes and a series of clicks. The flexibility of the Global.health platform means that it can be adapted to any infectious disease data and local context as new outbreaks occur. Global.health lays a foundation for researchers and public health officials to access this data no matter their location, be it New York, São Paulo, Munich, Kyoto or Nairobi.

Posted by Stephen Ratcliffe, Google.org Fellow and the Global.health team

How anonymized data helps fight against disease

Data has always been a vital tool in understanding and fighting disease — from Florence Nightingale’s 1800s hand drawn illustrations that showed how poor sanitation contributed to preventable diseases to the first open source repository of datadeveloped in response to the 2014 Ebola crisis in West Africa. When the first cases of COVID-19 were reported in Wuhan, data again became one of the most critical tools to combat the pandemic. 

A group of researchers, who documented the initial outbreak, quickly joined forces and started collecting data that could help epidemiologists around the world model the trajectory of the novel coronavirus outbreak. The researchers came from University of Oxford, Tsinghua University, Northeastern University and Boston Children’s Hospital, among others. 

However, their initial workflow was not designed for the exponential rise in cases. The researchers turned to Google.org for help. As part of Google’s $100 million contribution to COVID relief, Google.org granted $1.25 million in funding and provided a team of 10 fulltime Google.org Fellows and 7 part-time Google volunteers to assist with the project.  

Google volunteers worked with the researchers to create Global.health, a scalable and open-access platform that pulls together millions of anonymized COVID-19 cases from over 100 countries. This platform helps epidemiologists around the world model the trajectory of COVID-19, and track its variants and future infectious diseases. 


The need for trusted and anonymized case data

When an outbreak occurs, timely access to organized, trustworthy and anonymized data is critical for public health leaders to inform early policy decisions, medical interventions, and allocations of resources — all of which can slow disease spread and save lives. The insights derived from “line-list” data (e.g. anonymized case level information), as opposed to aggregated data such as case counts, are essential for epidemiologists to perform more detailed statistical analyses and model the effectiveness of interventions. 

Volunteers at the University of Oxford started manually curating this data, but it was spread over hundreds of websites, in dozens of formats, in multiple languages. The HealthMap team at Boston Children’s Hospital also identified early reports of COVID-19 through automated indexing of news sites and official sources. These two teams joined forces, shared the data, and published peer-reviewed findings to create a trusted resource for the global community.


Enter the Google.org Fellowship

To help the global community of researchers in this meaningful endeavour, Google.org decided to offer the support of 10 Google.org Fellows who spent 6 months working full-time onGlobal.health, in addition to $1.25M in grant funding. Working hand in hand with the University of Oxford and Boston Children’s Hospital, the Google.org team spoke to researchers and public health officials working on the frontline to understand real-life challenges they faced when finding and using high-quality trusted data — a tedious and manual process that often takes hours. 

Upholding data privacy is key to the platform’s design. The anonymized data used at Global.health comes from open-access authoritative public health sources, and a panel of data experts rigorously checks it to make sure it meets strict anonymity requirements. The Google.org Fellows assisted the Global.health team to design the data ingestion flow to implement best practices for data verification and quality checks to make sure that no personal data made its way into the platform. (All line-list data added to the platform is stored and hosted in Boston Children’s Hospital’s secure data infrastructure, not Google’s.)


Looking to the future

With the support of Google.org and The Rockefeller Foundation, Global.health has grown into an international consortium of researchers at leading universities curating the most comprehensive line-list COVID-19 database in the world.  It includes millions of anonymized records from trusted sources spanning over 100 countries.

Today, Global.health helps researchers across the globe access data in a matter of minutes and a series of clicks. The flexibility of the Global.health platform means that it can be adapted to any infectious disease data and local context as new outbreaks occur. Global.health lays a foundation for researchers and public health officials to access this data no matter their location, be it New York, São Paulo, Munich, Kyoto or Nairobi.