In Depth Show Blog – July 8, 2013

The main advice for college graduates using social media is never share anything you wouldn’t want a job recruiter to see. But sometimes the information military veterans post is a window that can reveal life-saving information. Researchers from what’s called the Durkheim project — a collaboration between Dartmouth and the Department of Veterans Affairs — are beginning a new big data analytics project to try and determine to what extent the online behavior of veterans and servicemembers can be a predictor of possible suicide. Chris Poulin, the director of the project, joins In Depth with more.

Taking 200,000 cars off the road is a commuter’s dream. It’s also the dream of environmentalists everywhere, and that dream is becoming a reality at the Energy Department. Josh Silverman, the director of the Department of Energy’s Office of Sustainability Support, has been nominated for a 2013 Service to America Medal in the category of Science and Environment.

PHOTOS: Meet the 2013 Service to America Medal Finalists

Some Pentagon employees are trying to boost morale on their first furlough day. Christel Fonzo, a civilian DoD employee, helped organize “The Federal Furlough Five Mile Run for Freedom.” She joins In Depth to discuss how she and more than 70 others are spending their furlough day.

A new memo just out today from acquisition leaders in the defense department serves as a reminder to the workforce — good purchasing decisions require reliable data on how individual contractors have performed in the past. The memo from Richard Ginman, DoD’s director of procurement and acquisiiton policy, points out that DoD is falling short of its goals for reporting contractor past performance so far this year — the department is doing so on only 78 percent of its contracts that meet a certain dollar threshold. It’s required to report 85 percent of them by the end of the year. The Government Accountability Office looked at this issue recently, reporting that DoD has work to do, but the department has actually made some significant progress on reporting contractor performance in the last several years. Bill Woods, director of acquisition and sourcing management issues at GAO, joins In Depth with more.