Happy New Year from The Carpentries Executive Director, Dr. Kari L. Jordan

I meditate quite often. Last week I participated in a practice whereby we meditated on various aspects of 2021, like resilience, acknowledging our needs, and caring for ourselves and others. During my time of meditation and reflection, I could not help but think about you – The Carpentries community. I will never truly know exactly what this community has endured over the past 24 months. What I do know is that you have shown up, and continue to show up, contributing to The Carpentries’ mission even when it is hard to do. For that, you have my sincere #CarpentriesGratitude.

Happy new year everyone! Shall we start the year off with #GreenStickies?

Chan Zuckerberg Initiative Partners with The Carpentries on DEI Outcomes

In June 2019, The Carpentries released an Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility (EIA) Roadmap. This roadmap is the overarching plan that outlines The Carpentries desired outcomes for equity, inclusion, and accessibility. One year later (June 2020), we engaged ReadySet to review our EIA Roadmap and existing diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) strategies, and HR operational structures. The firm recommended strategic focus areas for improving equity and inclusion across our organisational processes and communities. Those focus areas include:

1. Accessibility & Inclusion - There are observed and perceived gaps in accessibility of user experience in our workshops and instructor training, and across our community resources. Additionally, there are barriers to accessing our workshops, whether in-person or online, especially for those living outside of the Global North.
2. DEI Awareness & Education - There is room for increased DEI education and bias mitigation as it relates to the Core Team’s support of The Carpentries community.
3. Expansion in Underrepresented Communities - The Carpentries’ expansion efforts have been limited by a still developing global expansion plan and limited financial resources. While efforts have been made to grow a global presence, financial constraints have been a critical roadblock in expansion in underrepresented communities. Reliance on paying member organisations as a model creates barriers to reaching underrepresented communities.

To address these focus areas, we are proud to announce that the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative has awarded The Carpentries $399,300 to be used over 24 months. These funds will provide Carpentries memberships to institutions serving underrepresented groups in Central and South America and in Southern Africa; a full-time hire (2-year position) responsible for helping us better integrate accessibility across The Carpentries programs and services; and training and support to better integrate DEI awareness and education into The Carpentries operations and community.

Learn more about CZI’s work to advance diversity and inclusion in open source.

Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation Partners with The Carpentries on Curriculum, Community, and Assessment Outcomes

I take great pride in our community-curated lessons and want to see community members supported in teaching new and existing Carpentries curricula. Success in this area will include developing accessible pathways to onboard instructors to new curricula, and creating a community-led contributor recognition program. To improve pathways to receiving recognition for open source and community contributions,__the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation has awarded The Carpentries $973,160 to be used over 24 months to develop pathways for our community to contribute and receive recognition for their contributions to The Carpentries curriculum and community development efforts. These goals complement our Chan Zuckerberg Initiative projects to scale our Instructor Training and CarpentriesLab programs. Specific outcomes include:

1. Developing onboarding material to allow instructors to teach from each of The Carpentries official lesson programs.
2. Developing a badging and certification program to recognize instructors onboarded for individual curricula.
3. Assessing the impact of our curriculum and community development programs as we work to achieve our strategic plan for 2020-2025.

Learn more about Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation and Chan Zuckerberg Initiative’s support of The Carpentries.

The Carpentries join National Science Foundation (NSF) project: “Identifying Assets and Collaborative Activities to Support Student Success in Environmental Data Science at Minority Serving Institutions.”

The Carpentries has partnered with several mission-aligned organisations and partners at Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), and Tribal Colleges and Universities (TCUs) to build a network of support for and by HBCUs and TCUs in the US. This partner network includes the Academic Data Science Alliance, Center for Scientific Collaboration and Community Engagement, Native BioData Consortium, Atlanta University Center Data Science Initiative, SCORE-UBE Network, and National Environmental Observation Network. The network will co-create a set of recommendations for supporting student success in environmental data science at HBCUs and TCUs through two working groups. This work is supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant DUE-2135830.

As you can see, we have plenty to be excited about in 2022 as we collaborate together to advance our mission. I look forward to meeting and supporting this vibrant community, and as always, invite you to get in touch anytime. Happy New Year!