The Carpentries Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility Roadmap

The Carpentries envision a world where all people have access to data and a true understanding of the software skills they need to address questions that are important to them, bringing diverse perspectives to challenges in science and society. We understand that comprehensive knowledge is not enough, however. Creating an environment where contributors have access to the tools they need, and feel included in the open science/open data community is imperative. This is where equity, inclusion, and accessibility come together.

This quarter we embarked on a journey to develop an Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility Roadmap. This roadmap appreciates where we are, plans where we want to go, and maps out how we can get there. It is our overarching plan that outlines objectives for each staff team and program, and performance goals to help us meet our objectives. The roadmap also includes “stops”, or milestones we are working toward in collaboration with the community to achieve our objectives.

This roadmap was developed by collecting feedback from community members through our surveys, committee and task force meetings, community discussions, and interviews with diversity and inclusion leaders in open science and open data. Additionally, some ideas were already percolating among our staff team around equity, inclusion, and accessibility. We are grateful to everyone who filed GitHub Issues, and who contacted me directly to share experiences and perspectives.

We were both thoughtful and intentional when drafting this roadmap, and we hope it reflects what the community is experiencing and saying. Our major take home is that we must do this work with, not for the community. Collaboration is crucial.

Without further ado, we are releasing our Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility Roadmap!

The Carpentries Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility Roadmap

We will continue to iterate on this roadmap with your feedback. We invite you to share the roadmap, and give us your thoughts around the following questions via GitHub Issue.

1. Does this roadmap capture what the community is saying?
2. Is there anything missing?
3. Do you have ideas for projects that might help achieve our goals?