We’re really looking forward to some new programming offerings we’ve put together for the rest of the year! Read on to find out what’s coming up and how to get involved. If you’re not already a member of our community of practice for community builders in STEM, you can request to join our Slack workspace here.
Monthly community call schedule
Every month, we host a community call as an opportunity to learn and share on topics related to community management in STEM. While these calls are open to all, we generally draw inspiration from the members of our community and frequently showcase their expertise and outputs.
22 September 2021
This month’s call will feature our quarterly programming update, in which Director Lou Woodley and Comms Director Katie Pratt will share news from behind the scenes here at CSCCE. We’ll be offering more context around the items in this blog post as well as opening the virtual floor for comments, questions, and suggestions from the community. You can also expect to hear from our Lead Trainer and Curriculum Development Specialist Camille Santistevan, who is working on some exciting new online training offerings.
20 October 2021
Last year we published a guidebook describing the CSCCE Community Participation Model, a framework for creating strategic and engaging community programming. And now, we’ve just released the second part in this guidebook series which focuses on the role of community champions; emergent leaders who go the extra mile to maintain, grow, or evolve a community. During our October call we’ll offer some brief context about the guide, and then hear from community members who run formal programs to support community champions.
17 November 2021
Several community members expressed an interest in exploring community governance models. For our November call we’ll be inviting a couple of presentations on this topic, and also holding space for group breakout sessions to explore governance models currently in use in our communities.
15 December 2021
Every December we host a community potluck, in which everyone is invited to share. We’ll be putting together some activities for the event, but this is also a great opportunity to get to know others in the community in a less formal setting.
STEM Community Management Glossary Editathons
As part of our community programming, we’ve often hosted writing sprints for members of the community to co-author or review CSCCE resources. These co-working sessions have proved immensely valuable, not just as a means of getting work done, but also for getting to know one another and experiencing the joy that comes from co-creating.
Because of this, we wanted to make sprints part of our programming in their own right. For the rest of the year, we’ll be organizing “glossary editathons,” 90 minute sessions for anyone in the community to come and work on our nascent STEM community management glossary. We’d like to schedule these so that they accommodate the time zones of those taking part, and so we expect they will move around the calendar. If you’re interested in taking part, please let us know by emailing info@www.cscce.org.
Champions Working Group
Following the publication of our champions program guidebook, our champions working group is picking up pace again. Over the next three months, we’re going to be working on four new tip sheets on community champions programs. These tip sheets are the first of nine, one for each of the nine stages of creating a champions program that we identified in our latest guidebook.
If you’re interested in joining the working group, please let us know as soon as possible. While we’re happy for folks to join when they can, we will be scheduling our writing sessions very soon. Email info@www.cscce.org with any questions.
Internal Advocacy Working Group
We’ve heard several times over the last few months that it would be helpful for some of you to have resources that demonstrate the value and importance of community management in STEM. These might be useful when negotiating a job title change, asking for more resources to do the work, or to include in grant proposals.
We’d like to support a new working group to co-create such resources, and invite any member of the community to join. Email info@www.cscce.org to let us know of your interest.
Join us on “the virtual road”
While we’re not attending any in-person events this year, we are planning to facilitate workshops and participate in discussions at virtual events hosted by others. Here’s where you can find us:
2021 Inclusive SciComm Symposium | 14-16 October
We’ll be hosting an interactive session focused on inclusive language in science communication, including a game of Lingo Bingo and a chance to contribute to a new inclusive scicomm glossary.
Virtual SciDataCon 2021 | 18-28 October
CSCCE Director Lou Woodley is taking part in a session on “Building learning communities,” taking place on 21 October at 1pm UTC.
Japan Scicom Forum | 26-27 October
At this event we’ll be hosting a workshop focused on planning engaging virtual events, with activities that build on our PACT framework.
What would you like to see next year?
As you can see, it’s going to be a busy few months! We hope there is something here for you, if you have the bandwidth to get involved. But, if there’s something you’d like to see in the future let us know. We’re always open to member feedback, and while we can’t take on every suggestion that comes our way, we do our best to offer responsive programming that meets our members needs. Get in touch by emailing info@www.cscce.org