Resources

Chronicle of Higher education article with recommendations on centering accountability in DEI statements.

Fieldwork, including work done at sea, is a key component of many geoscientists’ careers. Recent studies have highlighted the pervasive harassment faced by women and LGBTQ+ people during fieldwork. However, transgender and gender diverse (TGD) scientists face obstacles which have not yet been thoroughly examined. The article’s authors fill this gap by sharing their experiences as TGD people. In this work, they provide recommendations for individuals, cruise leaders, and institutions for making seagoing work safer for our communities.

An example of a fieldwork safety manual from the Department of Biological Sciences at the University Pittsburg

After reflecting on their own research programs, the article’s authors propose four general principles to guide equitable, inclusive, ethical, and safe practices in field biology: be collaborative, be respectful, be legal, and be safe. This article provides suggestions for action-oriented approaches to make field biology more equitable, with particular attention to how those with greater privilege can contribute.

Field stations and marine laboratories (FSMLs) are sentinels of Earth’s climate, providing scientists with the infrastructure to collect data in otherwise inaccessible areas of the globe. Many FSMLs were built around and continue to perpetuate male-dominated institutional ideologies, making it difficult for women, BIPOC, and those with intersecting identities to progress, succeed, and thrive. In a collaborative effort across field ecologists and communication scholars working with women navigating these spaces, this book’s priorities are to: 1) document the gender history of FSMLs; 2) provide a context for the current organizational culture and understand the current communication climate dynamics; 3) explore current barriers to leadership, success, and factors that contribute to positive communication climates in FSMLs, and 4) explore strategies, programs, and interventions for supporting women’s leadership roles, as well as, to develop best practices for policy, resource allocation, and field station design to better support and increase women’s leadership roles in FSMLs.

This paper acknowledges that geographical fieldwork and fieldtrips can be deeply stressful, anxiety-inducing, troubling, miserable, hard and exclusionary for many colleagues, students and pupils. This paper draws on on qualitative data from research with UK university-based Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences (GEES) academics who self-identify as having mental health conditions which substantially affect their daily lives. These data prompt reflection on the nature and experience of fieldwork in two ways. First, they require acknowledgment of fieldwork as not just ‘muddy’, widening disciplinary imaginaries of fieldwork accessibility to encompass marginalities in/of Human Geography fieldwork practice. Second, contrary to pervasive disciplinary idealisations, these data demand recognition that fieldwork and fieldtrips are not necessarily gleeful but can be sites of intense latent anxiety and intersectional marginality.

ASTC developed this toolkit–with the help of several contributors–to provide concrete guidance on how to ensure that digital programs and experiences are accessible to a wide range of individuals, including those with disabilities. Although it’s oriented toward museum and science center interpreters, it’s got lots of valuable information for science communicators of all stripes.

To explore how field experiences can be designed to engage more community college students, the Undergraduate Field Experience Research Network (UFERN) held a “community conversation” (Community Colleges in the Field: Successful Programs and Strategies) on 15 October 2021. This article summarizes and provides synthesis of the discussion.

This paper presents a twenty-point anti-racism plan that organizations can implement to build an inclusive, equitable and accessible geoscience community. Enacting it will combat racism, discrimination, and the harassment of all members.

A comprehensive checklist that seeks to make fieldwork a “positive, generative, collective, and valuable experience for all participants.” Written by authors with a wide range of backgrounds and field experiences, this document stresses inclusivity over each step in the fieldwork process, from planning to the return and debrief.