About This Project
Making the Invisible Visible
~270,000 Lao Americans across all 50 states and DC are invisible in federal and state data systems because they are aggregated under “Asian” or “Other” categories. This portal disaggregates the data, reveals hidden disparities, and shifts community support from reactive crisis response to predictive early intervention.
This work was inspired by — and first built with — the ~15,000-strong Lao community in Minnesota, whose lived experience continues to shape the methodology now being extended nationally.
The Problem
When data about Lao Minnesotans is aggregated under “Asian,” critical disparities vanish. The aggregated “Asian” category — which includes Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Indian, and other communities with vastly different socioeconomic profiles — masks the unique challenges faced by Southeast Asian refugee communities.
Hidden by Aggregation
24%
Gambling addiction rate
4.8x the national average of 5%
34.8%
Linguistic isolation rate
Classified “High Risk”
45.3%
Elders with no formal schooling
Invisible in “Asian” averages
The Solution
Disaggregated Data Infrastructure
A comprehensive database of Lao-specific indicators across health, economic, education, and housing domains — showing what aggregated data hides.
AI-Powered Narrative Analysis
Multilingual NLP engine analyzing community narratives in Lao and English, extracting themes, sentiment, and early warning signals from community voices.
Predictive Risk Models
ML models predicting risk for gambling addiction, educational dropout, mental health crises, and elder isolation — enabling preventive intervention.
Community-Governed Ethics
Community IRB oversight, differential privacy, algorithmic fairness auditing, and consent management — data sovereignty by the community, for the community.
Project Lead
Dr. Phouthakannha Nantharath
Professor of Economics and a Research & Data Scientist
20+ Peer-Reviewed Publications
Concordia University, Saint Paul, Minnesota
Khon Kaen University, Thailand
Eastern International University, Vietnam
15 Years of Lao Community Leadership in Minnesota
“Behind every statistic is a family, a story, a life that deserves to be counted accurately and served with precision.”
Bring this portal to your state
The full community-data experience — narratives, predictions, early-warning alerts, research tools, and AI insights — is available in featured states where a local research partnership is in place. If you're a Lao community organization, academic researcher, public-health agency, or funder in another state, get in touch and we'll scope a partnership.
Contact: partner@laopeople.org