Here at CSCCE, we relish opportunities to learn from each other. So, for our annual potlucks, we ask everyone to bring knowledge instead of food! This year, we asked participants to bring their favorite tech tools and tips — and tech problems in search of solutions. Below is a smorgasbord of tools suggested by our Community of Practice, as well as a list of common tech problems with some suggested solutions for you to sink your teeth into. If you weren’t on the call but you’d still like to contribute, no problem! We used a Mural board to brainstorm, and you’re still welcome to add to it.
Continue reading “December, 2022 Community Call Recap: A Feast of Tech Tools”Author: CSCCE Blog Editor
CSCCE Community Manager Certification Program – More information available and live info sessions!
In July we announced that in 2023 we’ll be launching a new certification program for STEM Community Managers, building on our foundational training Scientific Community Engagement Fundamentals. Since we made that announcement, we’ve been listening to feedback and working on some details.
In this blog post, we share some updates, including when the first cohort will begin their course of study and how you can let us know that you plan on enrolling. We also share when we’ll be hosting info sessions so that you can get quick answers to any questions you might have, and how your organization can sponsor the program if you’d like to support the participation of others.
Continue reading “CSCCE Community Manager Certification Program – More information available and live info sessions!”November’s community call recap: Community managers share their strategies for engaging volunteers
For our November call, the theme was working with volunteers. Yanina Bellini Saibene (rOpenSci) moderated a discussion between Saranjeet Kaur (RSE Asia Association) and Melissa Mendonça (NumPy, SciPy, Matplotlib, and Pandas) with brief comments from Yared Abera Ergu (The Carpentries in Africa). The panelists addressed a range of topics including:
- The types of volunteer positions available in their communities
- What motivates their volunteers
- Problems with common approaches to volunteer labor and potential solutions
In this blog post, we provide brief descriptions of the panelists’ and facilitator’s backgrounds and summarize their thoughts on these three topics.
Continue reading “November’s community call recap: Community managers share their strategies for engaging volunteers”December Community Call: Our Annual Potluck
We like to send the year off with a little bit of fun, mixed with some contemplation and so for our December community call we’ll be hosting our fourth annual end-of-year potluck. This year, we’ll be focusing on tech tools for supporting community management on a shoestring budget!
As with most CSCCE events, this call will with be an interactive opportunity to:
- Try out some new ideas and/or tools that may be relevant for managing your own community
- Meet and connect with other STEM community managers to learn from one another
- Take an intentional moment in busy schedules to reflect and identify progress made and potential next steps in your own work
Rather than everyone bringing a dish to share, as is typical at most potlucks, all participants are welcome to bring examples of tools that they’ve used to solve specific problems – or problems in search of a tool! We’ll structure the meal (see below) so there’s time to share and time to learn.
Join us via Zoom on 14 December at 11am EST / 4pm UTC, and feel free to wear a festive hat or sweater to liven up our Zoom screens 🙂
CEF Reunion Recap: Graduates from 10 cohorts convened to celebrate 2 years of CEF!
Last week, we hosted two back-to-back (virtual) reunion celebration events, bringing together graduates from our foundational online training course, Scientific Community Engagement Fundamentals (CEF). It’s two years since we launched the pilot of the course, and since then almost 200 learners have participated. So, we wanted to mark the occasion with a celebration!!
Announcing digital badges for CSCCE’s multi-week trainings
With the rollout of several new courses in CSCCE’s training catalog comes a new credential to recognize our learners’ professional development: digital badges! These badges, which are only awarded to learners who complete all course requirements, can be displayed on personal websites, social media profiles, or as part of a digital CV or resume.
In this post, we share a bit about what it means to receive a digital badge from CSCCE, and how you can earn these badges along a path to certification as a Scientific Community Manager.
Continue reading “Announcing digital badges for CSCCE’s multi-week trainings”November’s Community Call: Creating fulfilling volunteer opportunities in open source software communities
Many STEM communities rely on volunteers, and yet it can be hard to sustain volunteer engagement. For our November call, we’ve invited three community managers from open source software organizations to participate in a panel discussion about how to create volunteer opportunities that are emotionally and intellectually fulfilling, and recognize and reward member contributions in these volunteer roles.
While our panelists this month all work with open source communities (which ties in with the new POSE training program we’re developing!), we encourage you to attend even if this isn’t your focus area. The discussion will be relevant to a range of STEM community settings.
Join us via Zoom on 16 November 2022 at 11am EST/4pm UTC (note that the US daylight saving’s transition may change the time for this monthly call in your time zone.)
October’s community call recap: STEM leaders share their definitions of successful community management
This month’s community call was part of an ongoing series focusing on the role of community, and the community manager, in STEM. These conversations flowed from the 25 Community Manager Case Studies we published earlier this year, and we’ll be publishing a report to summarize our findings in the coming weeks. In the meantime, you can catch up on our August (an overview of the case studies project) and September (a conversation about self-advocacy for community managers) calls on the CSCCE blog, and add our November call (which will focus on supporting and recognizing volunteers) to your calendar.
One of the common challenges identified from the case studies is that many community managers feel that their role is poorly understood, and so people in these roles sometimes find themselves juggling disparate definitions of success. During this session, we heard from three STEM leaders — Josh Greenberg from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, John Ohab from the Hertz Foundation, and Karthik Ram from the University of California at Berkeley — about how they think about the importance and impact of communities, and the qualities they look for in a successful community. This recap describes some of the themes that emerged during this discussion, and includes the recordings of each presentation.
Continue reading “October’s community call recap: STEM leaders share their definitions of successful community management”We’re hiring: Junior Trainer and Curriculum Assistant
The CSCCE team is in a period of growth and transition, and we’re excited to be able to open up this junior role on our training team!
If you are interested in honing your training skills, learning the behind the scenes workings of Canvas LMS, and immersing yourself in the world of community building in STEM, then maybe you are CSCCE’s next Junior Trainer and Curriculum Assistant.
Continue reading “We’re hiring: Junior Trainer and Curriculum Assistant”October’s Community Call: Expectations and Metrics
Our October call will focus on why community-building is important to different STEM organizations and what success looks like in each case. We’ll hear from three STEM leaders – each representing a different type of organization from a funder to a lead PI – about why community is important to the work they do.
Join us via Zoom on Thursday*, 20 October, 2022, at 11am EDT/3pm UTC.
*Please note that this month’s call is on a Thursday rather than during the regular Wednesday time slot due to speaker availability.
