The Environmental Data & Governance Initiative (EDGI) is monitoring changes to information and data on federal websites to hold our government accountable.
Interested? Contact Jake Wylie at edgi.websitemonitoring@protonmail.com
EDGI is monitoring tens of thousands of federal web pages to understand and reveal the ways in which public digital environmental information and access to information is being altered. Since January 2017, federal websites have been changed to reduce access to climate change information [1], downplay US reliance on clean energy [2], and increase emphasis on US jobs [3]. Among the most significant changes that we have reported on have been the removal of the Climate Action Reports from the State Department’s website [4] and the overhaul and removal of portions of the Environmental Protection Agency’s Climate Change website [5, 6, see screenshot below].
The ENTIRE Student’s Guide to Global Climate Change web domain was removed as part of the EPA’s website overhaul [7, 8].
Our work has been covered by The Washington Post, The New York Times, ProPublica, and more, and we actively collaborate with partner journalists. Check out EDGI’s Website Monitoring page for all of our reports.
EDGI’s Website Monitoring Team screens changes to websites flagged by our software, writes reports about significant changes, and disseminates reports to the media, transparency groups, and congressional offices.
Website Monitoring Analyst Volunteer (5-10 hours/week): Analysts track and classify website changes flagged by our version tracking software. Each analyst is responsible for monitoring a set of web domains on a weekly cycle, which is important for ensuring timely response and coverage. Please take this time commitment into account when considering volunteering. We work remotely over Slack and video conference, with weekly meetings to discuss significant changes, emerging themes, and project updates. Analysts interested in committing more time are encouraged to contribute to writing reports, as well as long-term pattern analysis.