matthew clifford

About

These days most of my work grows out of being a dad with some learning differences. From 2021–present I have been focused on parenting and school/local advocacy alongside independent technical work.

Analysis is the fun part. It is not the first part or the last part. Exploration, visualization, communication, solution identification and comparison, toolmaking: all tend to generate new questions. Analysis is an occasional phase in an ongoing conversation with the people impacted by the systems behind the data, and the staff using those systems to try to help.

Delaware's open data infrastructure is underused. Dataset versioning, audit logging, time series visualization — these are features the public already pays for, sitting unused on platforms state agencies have but don't leverage. There are so many quick wins possible here.

Systems are hard. Technology and language are important parts of systems, but ultimately, systems are made of people. And that means we have to listen actively, iteratively, over time, as contexts change.

Archival access, curation/contextualization, records preservation, institutional transparency, visual and aural culture; physical, digital, and economic accessibility through a disability justice lens — these are my preoccupations. I like when people make things. I like when people share. I applaud when neighbors find ready support from the state for solving problems they identify, that they care about, where they live.

Experience