Acknowledgments

The authors are deeply grateful to those who helped in ways large and small (mostly large). Lisa Knepper has served as a guiding light from the initial stages of this project, contributing in more ways than are possible to list. Perhaps more than anything, her knack for solving thorny problems saved us from running aground many a time. Mindy Menjou’s influence is also everywhere: She expertly edited the text, contributed key substantive ideas, and handled a truly outrageous volume of logistical tasks. This project does not happen without them.

We similarly could not have done this project without the wealth of expertise possessed by attorneys Anya Bidwell, Patrick Jaicomo, and Keith Neely. They helped us create our codebook definitions, generated ideas for the predictive algorithms, and answered our seemingly endless parade of technical questions. Likewise, Dick Carpenter has been there every step of the way, beginning with the original idea for this project. His statistical knowledge and all-around wisdom have been invaluable throughout.

The text benefited from thoughtful feedback from Scott Bullock, Dana Berliner, Caroline Grace Brothers, and Marie Miller, all of whom contributed ideas that wound up in our final report. Additionally, Trey Barrineau’s line edits were immensely helpful for streamlining and refining the final text.

Laura Maurice-Apel brought the report to life with her keen eye for color and expertly designed layouts, while Rima Gerhard skillfully transitioned the print report to the web.

Keith Diggs, Brennen VanderVeen, Brandon Livengood, and the aforementioned Keith Neely performed the thankless and time-consuming task of hand coding and labeling the data we used to build the algorithms. Their generosity of time and attention to detail were pivotal to this project’s success. Our data checkers Sarah Eckhardt, Harrison Weeks, Zachary Popovich, and Anthony Laudadio left no stone unturned, as did our legal cite checker and proofreader Evan Lisull.