The new Steering Committee is off and running with Mysti Downing from the San Antonio River Authority serving as Chair and Ginger Walker from P16Plus Council serving as Vice-Chair. The Steering Committee members are currently busy scoring nearly 50 potential projects on five criteria, including Power and Actionability/Feasibility. The Steering Committee will review those scores and plan some early wins and longer-haul projects to change our world. You can see that list of potential projects here. Want to suggest something else? You can do that here by checking out the User Story tab. After a project is submitted, it becomes part of the backlog of pending work until the Steering Committee has a chance to prioritize it and assess its feasibility so some projects may never make it to the top of the list.

The user story is a format commonly used in Agile Project Management for describing work that needs to be done in the project. New features, changes, bug reports, and new content all start with a user story.

The user story has a particular format: As a [type of user], I want [some goal], so that [some reason]. Using this format encourages us to state our needs in plain language, and provides the right context and direction to the project team when performing the work required to complete the story.

After a story is submitted, it becomes part of the backlog of pending work until the team is able to commit to completing the story in a particular time window, or sprint.

Example #1: As a non-profit, I want to download Census data for Bexar County so that I can estimate the needs for childcare in our service area.

Example #2: As a community member, I want access to local crime data so that I can know more about my neighborhood.