OpenCon
  • Resources
    • Resources
    • Community Report
    • Reflections
    • OpenCon 2018 Highlights
    • OpenCon 2017 Highlights
    • OpenCon 2016 Highlights
    • OpenCon 2015 Highlights
    • Community Call Guide
    • Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Report
  • Blog
  1. Home
  2. Blog
  3. Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion at OpenCon

We want to start a conversation about diversity, equity, and inclusion in the Open community.

Posted by Lorraine Chuen 1110.20SC on July 10, 2017

Read our OpenCon report on inclusive conference planning and contribute!

At OpenCon, we believe that scholarly information—academic journal articles, research data, educational resources—should be shared in an equitable way. It is important these values are also reflected in our communities and conference. Openness in research and education often embraces rhetoric around breaking down barriers to access, but are we practicing this in our own work? Although the Open movements are global in nature, privileged voices are typically prioritized in conferences. Marginalized voices—e.g. women, people of colour, those based in the Global South—are often underrepresented or sometimes excluded from the conversation altogether.

DEI_GroupPhoto.jpg

We want those involved in the Open Access, Open Data, and Open Education movements to ask: how can we minimize barriers to access—not only to academic materials and research data—but also barriers to participation in our own communities?  

We understand that if we want dialogue about these issues, we need to start by assessing our own community: What have we learned? What practices have we found helpful for creating a diverse and inclusive space at OpenCon? Where is there still room for improvement? 

Over the last few months, we have been working on the OpenCon Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion report to address these questions. The report was created to keep OpenCon transparent and accountable to our commitments to these values.  We also wanted to use the document to gather existing guidelines on planning accessible events, share our learnings, and to encourage other organizers to plan events that minimize barriers to participation. We hope the report can begin a discussion about these values in the broader Open communities.

A downloadable PDF version of the report can be accessed here.  

A digital version of the report can be accessed here.

DEI_Cover_Shot.png

Let us know what you think.

Like many communities, we understand OpenCon still has significant work to do when it comes to building diversity, equity, and inclusion into all aspects of our work. We hope this can be the start of an ongoing conversation. We welcome feedback and contributions by email [[email protected]], or directly to the online version of the report via Github.  Details on how to contribute can be found here.

Do you like this post?
Tweet

Showing 1 reaction


Sign in with

Facebook Twitter

Or sign in with email

    or Create an account


    Create an account

      or Sign in with email
      Please check your e-mail for a link to activate your account.
      • Joke Marquis
        Joke Marquis commented 2017-07-12 03:49:59 -0400
        This is a wonderful, far-reaching conversation. Will forward my contributions
      Sign in with Facebook Sign in with Twitter Sign in with Email


      Host a Satellite Event Get updates Take part in the community
      Tweets by @open_con
      Subscribe with RSS

      About

      About Us

      Media Resources

      Privacy Policy

      Code of Conduct

      Organizing Committee

      Follow us

      Except where otherwise noted, content on this site is licensed under Creative Commons Licence Created with NationBuilder..