Initiatives

Asian American Community Study

This comprehensive study focusing on the Asian American community includes surveys and other data sources to learn more about their experiences, attitudes and perceptions.

Election 2023 Survey

This report identifies the city's current challenges and opportunities and what issues residents would like to see the next mayor address.

Emergent Bilingual Students

The Houston Education Research Consortium conducts studies on how to support emergent bilingual students in the Houston region.

Greater Houston Community Panel

The Greater Houston Community Panel includes thousands of scientifically selected adults in Harris County, Texas, who are regularly surveyed about their families and communities, including their health, well-being, expectations, opinions, priorities and aspirations.

Housing Quality

Working with community organizations, the Kinder Institute is engaged in an effort to survey residents in targeted neighborhoods about the condition of their homes and neighborhoods.

Houston Community Data Connections

An interactive data platform, this initiative seeks to facilitate the practical use of data by city and community leaders for decision-making and capacity building in Houston's communities.

Houston Fire Department Culture of Safety and Risk Study

This study explores the experiences of firefighters and first responders in Houston.

Houston Solutions Lab

What are the biggest problems facing Houston? What tools do we have to solve them? Rice University and the City of Houston have joined forces to create Houston Solutions Lab, building on other recent efforts to bring together research and policy to help answer those questions.

Kinder Houston Area Survey

For over four decades, the Kinder Houston Area Survey has been tracking the changing attitudes and experiences of Houstonians.

Mobility, Opportunity Neighborhoods, and Family Impacts

This study, conducted in collaboration with the Houston Housing Authority, explores families' experiences with housing voucher programs, including HHA's new mobility program.

Population Health

This initiative informs interventions and policy recommendations that ultimately result in sustained improvements in health outcomes for all Houstonians.

Postsecondary Readiness

Postsecondary readiness broadly refers to how well students are prepared for education, employment or other pathways after high school.

Prekindergarten

Research has long linked early childhood education to later academic success and suggested it may be a critical part of closing the persistent academic disparities between student groups.

Resilience and Recovery Tracker

The Houston area’s Resilience and Recovery Tracker was developed by Rice University’s Kinder Institute for Urban Research with support from Chevron. It provides information on disaster recovery efforts from natural and man-made hazards, such as floods, climate disasters, public health crises, and chemical spills.

State of Housing

The Kinder Institute’s State of Housing in Harris County and Houston reports provide annual updates across a variety of housing-related indicators tracking shifts in the region's housing system. 

Student Mobility

HERC embarked on a multiyear study of student mobility in Texas and across the Houston area to better understand which students change schools and the consequences those changes have on educational outcomes.

Study on Social and Emotional Skills

Data gathered from this global research effort will help identify factors that support the development of social and emotional skills in students ages 10 and 15, and will provide an international context for how students exhibit these skills in their home countries.

The Equity Project

This comprehensive study of educational equity throughout Houston ISD focuses on understanding whether historically marginalized student populations in the district have the resources they need to be successful in the classroom and beyond.

Urban Data Platform

The Urban Data Platform is a computing environment and secure data repository of research-ready geocoded data for the Houston metropolitan area, facilitating cross-disciplinary research and community investigations.

Wraparound Needs

The student needs survey identifies key non-academic challenges students face across five domains: health, mental health, basic needs, home learning environment and enrichment activities.