The GivingTuesday Data Commons provides to the social sector what the commercial sector has long benefitted from: big data to drive better decision-making, build a more resilient social sector, and accelerate equitable social innovation.
Data Commons works with partners across sectors and borders to:
With hundreds of collaborators and 50 global data labs, the Data Commons has collected the most comprehensive datasets in the social sector and is the only initiative focused on collecting and analyzing individual giving behavior of all types.
In our latest brief, the GivingTuesday Data Commons investigated community care, mutual aid, the solidarity economy, and other types of informal giving within the United States, Canada, Mexico, United Kingdom, Brazil, India, and Kenya.
Read the Brief
The Fundraising Effectiveness Project (FEP) is a collaboration among fundraising data providers, researchers, analysts, associations, and consultants to empower the sector to track and evaluate trends in giving. Analyzed quarterly by the GivingTuesday Data Commons, this project offers one of the only views of the current year’s fundraising data in aggregate to provide the most recent trends for guiding nonprofit fundraising and donor engagement.
Q4 2022 Report
A look back into worldwide generosity in 2021, this report draws on a broad range of data sources to provide a unique window on the state of giving in 2021. We lay the foundation for a rethinking of how the social sector understands – and cultivates – generosity.
Read the Full Report
GivingTuesday’s GivingLab is the most comprehensive hub for international research on generosity, volunteerism, behavior science, movement building, and trends in giving. GivingLab gathers data and insights from academic sources, data platform providers, and others to help you leverage the power of generosity to do even more good.
Access the GivingLabCheck out more projects, tools, and datasets we have available like our 990 repository, GivingPulse survey, DAF research, Citizen Action Research, and donation trend dashboards.
Explore Data Commons Tools + Projects
GivingTuesday’s Data Commons Working Groups create a shared approach to research and an opportunity for giving platforms, researchers, academics, data scientists, and practitioners to collaborate on the following research themes:
Crowdfunding + Online GivingThis Working Group focuses on online giving, fundraiser and donor behavior, product innovations, customer and partner insights, and specific data science methodologies to uncover key motivators for how and why people contribute to crowdfunding campaigns and to uncover trends in online giving.
Workplace GivingSupported by Schwab Charitable, the Workplace Giving Working Group brings together leaders from a wide range of organizations seeking to bring more generosity into the workplace. Members of this group convene to identify methods for amplifying the effect of workplace giving campaigns, providing more agency to employees in the giving process, and ultimately creating better outcomes for beneficiaries, employees, and employers alike.
Impact MeasurementThis working group was formed to discuss one of the most fundamental questions of the nonprofit and philanthropy sector: how can we re-examine the role of impact measurement to ensure it serves beneficiaries and enables service providers to work more effectively? The group looks at impact measurement challenges from all angles, including capacity issues, equity, disconnects between funders and service providers, and incentives to compete rather than cooperate.
Crisis + GenerosityThis working group explores how generosity can be mobilized during times of crisis and how responses from civil society can be resourceful and creative. Specifically, the group is interested in how to rapidly identify needs on the ground and the networks and players best equipped to respond at the outset of a crisis, the kind of data infrastructure needed to understand these networks, and how predictive technology can produce the data needed to get ahead of crises.
Generosity AIThe Generosity AI Working Group is a cross-sector collaboration between practitioners in tech, academics, and the social sector who are exploring ways that artificial intelligence (AI) can be used to advance missions and grow generosity at scale. This working group will explore the role of knowledge-sharing platforms, learning networks, and communities of practice in accelerating AI adoption for social good. It will also identify strategies to address issues related to resource constraints, governance, data sharing, and equity in collaborative AI projects.
For more information or to join a working group, please contact Will Taylor.
GivingTuesday supports academic research in the generosity ecosystem by working collaboratively with researchers, data partners, and social good organizations around the world. We encourage research in various fields related to giving including biological research, historical studies, data modeling, behavioral economics, etc. If you have a project that you feel will increase sector knowledge, we’d like to help!
The GivingTuesday Data Commons Academic Research Collaborative seeks to:
Reach out to Tan Madhavan at tan@givingtuesday.org to explore ways in which we might be able to support you!
