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Data Stewards Trends to Watch: July 2025 Session

Posted on 7th of August 2025 by Paulina Behluli

Data Stewards Trends to Watch: July 2025 Session
Data Stewards Trends to Watch: July 2025 Session

We often speak of living in an era of data abundance. Yet gaining access to the right data—and re-using it in systematic, sustainable, and responsible ways—remains a major challenge. Beyond technical and policy infrastructure, what’s often missing is the human infrastructure: the skills, capacities, and institutional roles needed to steward data in the public interest.

In response to this challenge, The Data Tank and The GovLab have partnered to offer executive courses (what we call “bootcamps”) in Data Stewardship.Our global alumni network now includes more than 160 trained data stewards. As to engage our alumni on a regular basis we offer a regular “Trends to Watch” series which focuses on the most recent developments in data stewardship and governance. 

In the July 2025 edition, Stefaan Verhulst, lead of the Data Stewards Courses, shared updates based on the five identified functions of data stewardship

  • Stewarding data and questions; 

    • Guiding question: How do we provide access to data so that it can be reused in a more systematical, sustainable, and responsible way? 

  • Stewarding partners; 

    • Guiding Question: How do we understand what people want with regard to how data is being used? What engagement models or social license needs to be established towards this end? 

  • Stewarding internal processes and relations; 

    • Guiding Question: How can we map internal data resources and expertise, keep stakeholders informed, and ensure timely approval of data reuse initiatives?

  • Stewarding sustainability; 

    • Guiding Question: How do we embrace data stewardship and responsible governance by building the right infrastructure, developing strong business cases for data reuse, measuring impact, and securing funding for collaborative initiatives?

  • Stewarding insights. 

    • Guiding Question: How do we go about transforming data to decision intelligence and generate insights? 

 

Roles of a Data Steward

Check out the recording of this edition. The following resources were covered during this session: 

Stewarding data and questions: 

Policy Developments: 

Technology Developments: 

 

Stewarding partners: 

Stewarding internal processes and relations: 

 

Stewarding sustainability: 

 

Stewarding insights: 



Interested to learn more about data stewardship trends? Sign up for the Data Stewards Network mailing at this link. Or contact [email protected] to learn more.

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