community of practice Archives

Planning and launching a new champions program – and online community platform – at the Michael J Fox Foundation

Over the last few months, we’ve been working with Josh Gottesman and Leslie Kirsch at the Michael J Fox Foundation to plan a new online community of practice intended to support conversations about the sharing and reuse of data related to Parkinson’s Disease Research.

As is the norm for many community projects, we’ve been taking a phased approach to the launch of this Data Community of Practice (DCoP) – working to understand the needs of the nascent community and then identifying a small group of community champions to help test the online platform and seed initial conversations before opening the community to a wider membership.

In this blog post, we share more about how we supported MJFF through member research, the selection and design of a new online community platform, resource creation and scaffolding for their new Data Community Innovators (DCIs) program, and the planning and hosting of a DCI kick-off meeting at MJFF’s offices in NYC.

February’s Community Call – Creating inclusive community resources and programming

As a community manager, you work hard to create resources that are available to as many people as possible. When it comes to digital resources, this includes making sure that your PDFs are screen-reader compatible, your Zoom calls are captioned, and your slide decks don’t feature text that is too small.

On this month’s call, we’ll hear from CSCCE staff and members of our community of practice about how to create accessible resources, as well as check whether your existing resources need an update.

Date: Wednesday, 22 February 2023

Time: 11am EST / 4pm UTC

Zoom link to join: click here

Add to calendar: click here

Join this month’s call to find out how you can make your resources and programming more accessible. Image credit: CSCCE

January’s community call – What’s coming up for CSCCE in 2023

Happy New Year! The turning of the year is often accompanied by transition, setting new intentions, and planning for the months ahead. That’s certainly where we find ourselves at CSCCE, with 2023 promising to be a huge year for our growing organization.

In our first community call of the year, we’ll share what’s coming up, including new courses, clients, and community programming. This is a great way to catch up if some of our newsletters fell into the cracks of December email chaos, or if you’re new to our community of practice and would like to find out more about opportunities to get involved. Our calls are open to anyone, so if you’re not yet a community member but you’re interested in what we do to support STEM communities and the people who build them, please do feel free to join.

Date: Wednesday, 18 January 2023

Time: 11am EST / 4pm UTC

Zoom link to join: click here

Add to calendar: click here

*Our January community call will be an update from the CSCCE virtual offices, during which we’ll share what we have coming up in 2023. Image credit: CSCCE*

Tools trials are back this summer!

Ever wanted to test out a new platform or app but needed some more users to make it worthwhile? That’s what CSCCE tools trials are for!

And this summer we’ll be hosting a short series of three tools trials to try out Butter (a tool for administering breakout rooms), Gather (specifically their new escape room), and a third tool of your choosing (let us know what you’d like to trial here).

Read on for more information, including calendar invites and what to expect!

It’s Community Manager Advancement Day! Some ideas to hone your skills and grow your professional network with CSCCE

Today is Community Manager Advancement Day (CMAD), and this year the focus is on professional development for community managers!

What is CMAD?

If this is the first you’re hearing about the annual celebration of community managers, a little background. CMAD was created in 2010 by Jeremiah Owyang, a technology professional specializing in the intersection of technology and human behavior. Community members are encouraged to send messages of thanks to their community manager (using the hashtags #CMAD and #CMGR), and organizations that support community managers often host events or release resources to mark the occasion and explore the year’s theme (for example, last year we hosted a community call on 2021’s CMAD theme of resilience).

We’re hiring! Part-time communications assistant: Learn about community-centric communications with us as you start a new career

Are you interested in a career in STEM communications and/or community management? Then read on, because we’d love to hear from you!

We’re looking to hire a temporary, part-time communications assistant to help us as we enhance our member engagement infrastructure. This is a great position for someone who is looking to transition out of academia, or would benefit from flexible working hours. And while this is an entry-level role, we’re definitely open to applicants with more advanced qualifications but who see value in learning new skills in community-centric communications.

July’s community call: Adding to the collection of CSCCE community profiles

Our July community call focused on one of CSCCE’s ongoing research projects: Creating scientific community profiles. We heard from Lou Woodley and Katie Pratt, who led the project, as well as three of the scientific community managers who took part in the project. In this blog post we briefly recap why we’re doing this work, what’s coming in the next few months, and share videos of the three community manager presentations.

If you are interested in creating a profile for your community, please let us know by filling out this short form.

A selection of some of our newest community profiles. Image credit: CSCCE

Summer 2021: Opportunities to deepen your connections within the CSCCE community of practice

This summer, we are focusing our community programming on building a denser network of connections within the CSCCE community of practice. This means not only creating opportunities for new connections to form, but also to strengthen the relationships that already exist. In this blog post, we highlight the events and activities we’re hosting to meet these goals, and we hope that you’ll mark your calendars to join in. If you’re not already a member of the community, you can request an invitation to our Slack workspace.

December’s Community Call: It’s time for our annual potluck party!

It’s potluck time, and you’re invited! Join us for our second annual celebration and reflection, where you bring a “course,” connect with your fellow scientific community managers, and raise a glass to the highs and lows of a tumultuous year.

This year’s potluck will take place on Wednesday, 16 December at 7pm UTC / 2pm EST. Click here to join, and read on to find out what to bring!

First Birthday Series: The importance of co-creating resources in a community of practice

For our “First Birthday Series” of blog posts, we are taking some time to reflect on CSCCE’s community of practice, which turned one year old on 21 October 2020. Our first post summarised the community “by the numbers,” then we delved a little deeper into our programming offerings.

In this post, jointly authored by Communications Director, Katie Pratt and Center Director, Lou Woodley, we take stock of our resource collection, which now comprises eight pages on our website and includes 28 free-to-download guidebooks, worksheets, and community profiles in our Zenodo community repository.