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Tools and resources that support DEIA in the information community Recording
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Tools and resources that support DEIA in the information community Recording
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Segment:0 .
CAMILLE CALLISON: Greetings we're here today for the panel on tools.
CAMILLE CALLISON: And resources that support diversity, equity. Inclusion and accessibility in the information community where we meet today in this virtual gathering, I would like you to take a moment to acknowledge the importance of the lands on which we work and call home. We acknowledge that those of us living on what is now known as North America are living and working on Indigenous Peoples' land.
CAMILLE CALLISON: At the same time, I want to acknowledge that many others have been removed and disconnected from their homes. And cultures by military force. Climate change. Of corporate greed. And other agents of capitalism or colonialism that may prevent access for good health policy and stability for people across the globe.
CAMILLE CALLISON: For this reason, we work very hard at providing inclusion and accessibility. In a way that transmits knowledge and prioritizes people who are Indigenous and marginalized from marginalized communities. I believe it's our responsibility of all of those who have benefited from the very structures of colonialism that were often used to oppress and marginalize people in their own land, to work towards a better and a more equitable future moving forward.
MERRILEE PROFFITT: Thank you, Camille. Our session today will focus on the information community's efforts to be more diverse, equitable, inclusive and accessible. What are some of the key tools. And resources that are available to us? Who is using them? And what can we learn from their experiences?
MERRILEE PROFFITT: And how should we decide which to adapt in our own organizations? We're very pleased to welcome this talented and wonderful group of speakers today, and we will introduce them to you in turn.
CAMILLE CALLISON: So thank you so much, Merrilee. I want to introduce the presentation on Indigenous knowledge and data sovereignty. We have two presenters today, one of whom is Dr. Stephanie Russo Carroll.
CAMILLE CALLISON: She is a Dene/Ahtna, a citizen of the native village of Kluti-Kaah in Alaska and of Sicilian descent. She is based at the University of Arizona as an assistant professor in community, environment and policy. So she has actually many, many has many hats that she holds at the Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health. As well, the American Indian studies graduate interdisciplinary program.
CAMILLE CALLISON: She's an affiliate faculty at the College of Law. Acting director and assistant research professor at the Udall Center for studies and public policy. She's also an associate director at native nations Institute at the Udall Center as well. She is also the director of the Collaboratory for Indigenous Data Governance.
MERRILEE PROFFITT: So Stephanie is joined by Dr. Jane Anderson, an associate professor of anthropology and Museum studies, as well as a global fellow in the Engelbert Center for Innovation Law and Policy in the law school at New York University.
MERRILEE PROFFITT: Her work is focused on the philosophical and practical problems for intellectual property law and the protection of Indigenous traditional knowledge, resources and cultural heritage in support of Indigenous knowledge and data sovereignty. Welcome, Stephanie and Jane.
STEPHANIE RUSSO CARROLL: I'm Stephanie Caroll. And I'm here with my colleagues, Maui Hudson and Jane Anderson. We begin with the story of talking about the provenance of Indigenous peoples data by focusing on the CARE principles for Indigenous data governance.
STEPHANIE RUSSO CARROLL: So in response to the increased generation and use of data in open science and data environments and the limited opportunities that Indigenous peoples have for control, access and use of our data within these environments, a network of Indigenous scholars led the development of the CARE principles for indigenous data governance through the Global Indigenous Data Alliance. So the CARE principles work to shift the focus of data governance from consultation to values based relationships, and they bring a people and purpose orientation to data governance, which complements the data centric nature of the FAIR principles.
STEPHANIE RUSSO CARROLL: So the FAIR principles are seeking to increase data sharing, and at the same time, Indigenous peoples are seeking to control their data. So implementation of the CARE and FAIR principles together should be seen as necessary to allow Indigenous peoples to govern, access and use their data and to share on their own terms. Once the CARE principles were released in 2019, it became evident that we needed to develop criteria for implementation of them, but also to begin to work through mechanisms for operationalization.
MAUI HUDSON: And so one of the tools or the mechanisms which we've been drawing on as we start thinking about the implementation of care, has been the traditional knowledge and biocultural labels that are part of the Local Context initiative. These these labels are digital tags, which can be added to our records to help bring cultural authority back back into the record. The interesting thing about the development of these labels is that they've happened alongside communities and reflect community aspirations and expectations around protocols, permissions and importantly provenance.
MAUI HUDSON: Where across that community the cultural authority sets.
JANE ANDERSON: So this led us to think about what could standards look like in this area. And so we approached the IEEE with a PAR in July 2020 and established the PAR 2890 for recommended practice for the provenance of Indigenous Peoples' data. And the project details are really thinking about how we detail the rules by which the provenance of Indigenous Peoples' data should be described and recorded.
JANE ANDERSON: And this is really the focus of the standard, the recommended practice. It outlines the core parameters providing and digitally embedding provenance information for Indigenous Peoples' data. It supports proper and appropriate disclosure of originating data information and ensures the long term identification of Indigenous Peoples' data for future use. Connecting data to people in place and when appropriate. Supporting future benefit.
JANE ANDERSON: Sharing options.
MAUI HUDSON: So how are we doing this? I think it's important to note that part of the reason for focusing on provenance in the first instance has been about ensuring that information. If you can't tell that an information comes from an Indigenous community, then you're not in a position to govern it.
MAUI HUDSON: So an important part of findability is ensuring that the right provenance information is available. Similarly, as we went into this process, we thought it was really important to prioritize Indigenous peoples. And when we're thinking about the provenance of Indigenous peoples data, what our definition is that we'll use in relation to Indigenous peoples.
MAUI HUDSON: And so we've drawn on the UN Special Rapporteur definition. Indigenous communities, peoples and nations are those which have a historical continuity with pre-invasion pre-colonial societies that developed on their territories consider themselves distinct from other sectors of society. Now prevailing in those territories or parts of them, they form at present, non-dominant sectors of society and are determined to preserve, develop and transmit to future generations.
MAUI HUDSON: The ancestral territories and the ethnic identity as the basis for their continued existence as peoples and accordance with their own cultural patterns, social institutions and legal systems. As as we moved along this process, it was also important to prioritize indigenous leadership. And so one of the co-leads on this project has been Stephanie Carroll, who's Dene/Ahtna and works at the Native Nations Institute at the University of Arizona.
MAUI HUDSON: In support of that, we also developed an indigenous caucus so different the indigenous members of the working group will get together and caucus to advise the working group and support with outreach to Indigenous communities and help to build consensus around the recommended practice.
STEPHANIE RUSSO CARROLL: Our workflows over the past three years began with creating subgroups that worked during 2020 and 2021.
STEPHANIE RUSSO CARROLL: In the spirit of Indigenous leadership, we had an Indigenous leader and an ally lead on each subgroup and they subgroups addressed issues such as the scope and purpose of the recommended practice. Related and adjacent standards and use cases. Conceptual issues that came up around the recommended practice for the provenance of Indigenous peoples data as well as our drafting subgroup. Our drafting subgroup has been working during 2022 and now into 2023 to establish a minimum set of information for the provenance of Indigenous peoples data for all actors.
STEPHANIE RUSSO CARROLL: Identify when obligations arise for the provenance of Indigenous peoples data and also how long those obligations persist. And then discuss where and how the provenance of Indigenous peoples data should be disclosed. Into the future. A next steps around. The work that we're doing for the drafting is as a new experience for an IEEE recommended practice or standard, where we will have a months long process of community engagement so that we can receive feedback on the recommended practice draft from Indigenous peoples and scholars and experts.
STEPHANIE RUSSO CARROLL: And this will include work with the Global Indigenous Data Alliance through their website and through their engagements. Other Indigenous data sovereignty networks across the globe, engaging with Indigenous leaderships, groups, leadership groups, both international and local. So from here in the United States, that might mean working with the National Congress of American Indians, as well as with tribes, and then attending key conferences.
STEPHANIE RUSSO CARROLL: We will then redraft and go through the IEEE process for a recommended practice at that point.
JANE ANDERSON: And this recommended practice really hints at the future work that will happen in this area. Obviously, kind of thinking through what is in the recommended practice will also lead into establishing common descriptors and controlled vocabulary for prominence, particularly including recommendations for metadata fields that can be used across industry sectors, particularly in machine learning and AI contexts, but also within biodiversity and genomic science, innovation and other databases.
JANE ANDERSON: We'll be developing equivalent standards, for example, within ISO and then also developing complementary standards or a family of standards that work to support indigenous data sovereignty and Indigenous data governance. So that's our presentation for you today, and we look forward to you engaging with us, particularly through the Global Indigenous Data Alliance, which is where the recommended practice will be posted for feedback.
JANE ANDERSON: Thank you.
MERRILEE PROFFITT: Our next presentation is Joint Commitment for Action on Inclusion in Diversity and Publishing.
CAMILLE CALLISON: We welcome Nicola Nugent, who is the publishing manager, quality and ethics, Royal Society of Chemistry, where she's a strategic lead for quality and impact across journals and books, Her presentation. Joint Commitment on Action, on Inclusivity and Diversity in Cublishing covers the Royal Society of Chemistry's framework for action, the joint commitment for action on inclusion and diversity and publishing minimum standards for inclusion and diversity in scholarly publication and will preview a new recommended question for diversity and data collection.
MERRILEE PROFFITT: So for the panel discussion with our panelists, we are very sorry that Nicola will be unable to join us for the discussion portion, but we are very pleased to be joined by Holly Falk-Krzesinski, vice president, research intelligence at Elsevier, who can speak to this work.
NICOLA NUGENT: All right. So my name is Nicola Nugent. I'm Publishing Manager, Quality & Ethics at Royal Society of Chemistry.
NICOLA NUGENT: And I'm going to be talking today about the joint commitment for action on inclusion and diversity in publishing. And in my 10 or 12 minutes or so, I'm going to talk about a bit of an overview of what the joint commitment is and how it came about. I'll talk about who's involved and how it all works and cover a few highlights of what the initiatives achieved and very briefly look towards the future.
NICOLA NUGENT: So taking a bit of a step back as to where things started, I wanted to share with you this document called a framework for action in scientific publishing, which was produced by the Royal Society of Chemistry back in early 2020, which on the back of some work of our inclusion and diversity team looking at gender bias in publishing. And this document really sets out the steps we're taking across our journals to try to minimize bias across our processes.
NICOLA NUGENT: And that work came from a study on gender bias. But the framework is very much focusing on all forms of diversity, not just gender. So we launched this framework document, as I said, back in the first half of 2020 with our editorial boards and our internal editorial teams at Royal Society of Chemistry. And they used it, and indeed, they actually continue to use it to evaluate progress, to stimulate discussion, conversations, and to really plan and prioritize opportunities for action.
NICOLA NUGENT: And when we launched it, we, we recognized that the framework, while it is RSC focused to an extent. And we recognized that it could be useful for other publishers. And so we wanted to share it. And you can see there's a link on the screen where it's publicly available. So if you haven't seen it before, it, you know, feel free to go and have a look and look through and see if it's useful to you.
NICOLA NUGENT: But back in 2020, we shared it and I got some initial feedback with from a couple of contacts in other publishers and got some positive feedback from them. And so we set up a workshop with around 10 other publishers with whom we had already had contacts and to share our framework for action document. And as well as sharing that document and talking about that, we had a discussion session in that workshop where we talked about the areas on which publishers could collaborate in with respect to inclusion and diversity.
NICOLA NUGENT: And really a direct outcome of that workshop is the joint commitment initiative. So this slide shows the four priority areas that were identified and articulated in that workshop that I spoke about. And those really form the basis of the joint commitment statement, which you can find at the link on the top right of the slide. And these are the areas that those who've joined the joint commitment, these are the areas that we have committed to collaborate on.
NICOLA NUGENT: So firstly, understanding our research community, we've committed to work together to enable diversity data to be self-reported by members of our community. Secondly, in terms of reflecting the diversity of our community, so this is about using that data to set baselines, potentially set targets, and really try to move towards improving representation and monitoring progress. Sharing success to achieve impact is just all about sharing, learning and knowledge and really working together.
NICOLA NUGENT: And trying to use shared language and standards and so on to move things forward on Inclusion and diversity in publishing more quickly. And finally, we committed to setting minimum standards on which to build. And I'll say more about those in a moment. First, I just want to give you a flavor on this slide of who is involved in the joint commitment. So when we started and launched all this back in June of 2020, I think we started with 13 signatory organizations and since then, we've grown to over 50 which are shown here.
NICOLA NUGENT: So you can see from the logos on here that the members of the initiative are from all different types of publishers covering lots of different disciplines. And I think that's actually one of the, you know, major achievements of the initiative has been, you know, getting publishers together to set aside competitive differences and really drive change across the publishing sector as a whole.
NICOLA NUGENT: In terms of how it works. So I just want to emphasize the joint commitment statement isn't just a statement that that publishers sign up to. It really is all about action. And so we have formed a working group that comprises at least one representative from each of the signatory organizations. And then we have subgroups that take forward specific areas of action under each of the four commitments.
NICOLA NUGENT: And this is really to ensure that we deliver on our promises so the subgroups meet and share information regularly. And then we have whole working group meetings three times per year to review progress, agree actions and set direction. And so this slide has a timeline showing. What I hope you'll agree is, is, you know, the impressive progress that the group has made in the 2 and 1/2 years since our inception back in June of 2020.
NICOLA NUGENT: So right from the beginning, we've served as a knowledge sharing network for our members sharing, learning and resources. We've worked on things like author name change practices. Tackling harmful historical content. But what I want to talk in a bit more detail about today is two of our more recent initiatives our minimum standards, which I'll run through briefly. And then also the recommended questions for gender identity and race and ethnicity that were published in 2022.
NICOLA NUGENT: So first of all, the minimum standards. So the idea here, this was one of our original commitments to set minimum standards on which to build. And the idea here is to really enable senior leaders in publishing and editorial decision makers, editorial boards and so on to evaluate their progress on inclusion and diversity and also to identify and take achievable, specific actions to improve inclusion and diversity in publishing.
NICOLA NUGENT: So just to go through those really quickly, we have the first one is about ensuring inclusion and diversity are integrated into publishing activities and strategic planning and working to understand the demographic diversity of authors and editors and so on. I'll say a bit more about that in a moment. Number three is about acknowledging the barriers within publishing that those from underrepresented communities face and really taking action to address those barriers.
NICOLA NUGENT: Number four is about defining and being really clear about what are the specific responsibilities of the different actors in the scholarly publishing process, of authors, reviewers, editors and so on, setting clearly what their responsibilities are towards inclusion and diversity. The fifth one is thinking about editorial boards and the process for appointing editorial boards and editors to make sure that that process is capturing the widest possible talent pool and isn't, for example, overly reliant on personal networks.
NICOLA NUGENT: And lastly, publicly reporting on progress, on inclusion and diversity on an annual basis. So a couple of things just to emphasize about these minimum standards. First of all, is that we're not talking here about sort of human resources management. It's not about the staffing side of things. And it's very much focused on the sort of editorial and product side of things.
NICOLA NUGENT: And secondly, to say that there's a clear understanding that the detailed implementation of these standards will vary. So that they've been written in such a way that they can be adopted in a way that suits the different types of publishing organizations out there. And provided, you know, we expect obviously organizations to adopt them in good faith and just to run through that.
NICOLA NUGENT: In terms of an example, by what I mean, if we think about the last point here about reporting on progress annually for some organizations, that could be, you know, a formal multi-page, you know, detailed document and report for other organizations. You know, it could be more like a one page blog post. So both of those are publicly reporting on your progress and the way that you do
NICOLA NUGENT: that would obviously depend on the type of organization, the scale and the resources that you have. So that's the minimum standards. The second piece of work I want to cover is our recommended questions for gender identity and race and ethnicity, data collection. So really quickly, this is the gender recommended question for collecting gender identity, and this is now available for users of the ScholarOne submission and peer review system and will soon, I believe, be available to non-Elsevier users of the Editorial Manager system.
NICOLA NUGENT: So here we have a, you know, specific question with a single option answer. The options provided are terms that relate to gender identity, not biological sex. And there's no distinction between cis or transgender. And the options also are not limited to binary options. And finally, there is an option prefer not to disclose, which ensures compliance with the likes of GDPR. And, you know, there's a significant amount of work gone into devising this question, making sure, you know, there's a lot of knowledge sharing between different publishers, how others were asking this, bringing in different expertise to make sure that this is, you know, a good as good as it can be in terms of how to collect this data.
NICOLA NUGENT: And so we hope this kind of question can become a standard way that publishers and journals can collect this data from their communities so that we are all collecting comparable data sets over time. And so we started work with a gender question and we were able to, you know, put forward a recommended question quite quickly. What took a little bit longer was our work on devising questions to collect race and ethnicity data.
NICOLA NUGENT: And as you can imagine, that's, you know, a level of complexity, you know, above thinking about gender. And what we were really aiming for here was a schema for the collection of race and ethnicity data that works in the context of global publishing. So, you know, an international survey, you know, we're asking authors, reviewers and editors from all around the world. We needed question and answers that made sense.
NICOLA NUGENT: And so that's what we were aiming for. And that's been developed, you know, through an iterative process, through one of the subgroups of the joint commitment. They took this on where, you know, members of that subgroup all shared questions that they may have already been using in certain scenarios, shared their insights. Some examples there.
NICOLA NUGENT: You know, there was a Springer Nature staff survey that was shared, an ACS survey, input from the Elsevier inclusion and diversity board and as well as all of that sort of and much else as well from other publishers and as well as all of that internal knowledge that those publishers were able to bring. That group also made use of the published literature in this area.
NICOLA NUGENT: And really importantly through Elsevier, the group engaged an external subject matter expert, professor Ann Morning, who is at New York University and who has expertise in racial classification and related topics. So her input was extremely important. And so all of that knowledge and information was put to good use, along with quite extensive testing of the questions, with over 1,000 researchers before finalizing the questions which are now live and look like this.
NICOLA NUGENT: So these are, again are available for Scholar One users and will soon be available for editorial manager users. And so what you can see here well, first of all, I should emphasize that the intention here is not about devising a single prescriptive truth about someone's race and ethnicity. It's about putting in front of someone a set of options that resonate with them that they understand, and that people from around the globe it will be meaningful to them and that they will therefore be willing and able to self-report their ethnicity.
NICOLA NUGENT: And secondly, in terms of the number of options and the sort of level of aggregation of the options, again, this is about, you know, working within the scale of the diversity data that we can practically accommodate and make use of. So what we've ended up with is these two questions. The first one asks about ethnic origins or ancestry. And as you can see, the options to choose from are geographic regions.
NICOLA NUGENT: And the idea here is that in the context of a global survey or question, going out globally through a peer review system, for example, is to provide options for responses that are familiar to people answering the question and are meaningful to them, as I said. And so geographic location and ancestry really have that, you know, resonance and and familiarity around the world. And actually, it's true that only a small number of countries actually employ race in sort of official data collection like census information and so on.
NICOLA NUGENT: So racial self-identification is a much less common experience in many areas of the world compared to, say, the United States or the United Kingdom. And so in this sort of international context of journal publishing, this question on geographic origins is likely to have a higher response rate and garner, you know, more complete data. Having said all of that, though, we do follow up with a question about race.
NICOLA NUGENT: And the idea here is that these what's. Captured in these race labels in this part of the question, these are likely to be particularly influential for an individual's opportunities and life outcomes. And so in the context of inclusion and diversity work, you know, this is particularly informative and can add information over and above those geographic origins question that precedes it.
NICOLA NUGENT: So those are the recommended questions for collection of gender identity and race and ethnicity data. There's a lot more context and information available on the website where this link is here, so please do take a look at that. And if you're a publisher thinking about collecting this data, please do consider implementing these questions.
NICOLA NUGENT: Finally, I just want to very briefly take a look to the future. So for the joint commitment initiative more broadly. You know, although as a group, we've, you know, I believe we've achieved a great deal, you know, certainly not done yet. We continue to actively work on delivering our four commitments that we made initially. We've recently been really refreshing and reorganizing our subgroups.
NICOLA NUGENT: Our current focus is really on that data collection piece and implementing that across publishers. And then over the past few months, we've been working on agreeing a new leadership structure for the initiative. So we're now in the process of forming a steering committee to really take on the role of shaping the future priorities and work of the initiative. And that's all for me. Thank you very much.
MERRILEE PROFFITT: OK so we are so pleased to for the paper building equity, diversity, inclusion and accessibility in scholarly communications, the C4DISC toolkits presented by Patty Baskin, who is the executive editor of The Neurology family of journals at the American Academy of Neurology. Her role includes strategic planning, analyzing trends and recommending future innovations for the journals, as well as developing and upholding policies.
MERRILEE PROFFITT: She represents C4DISC from both her role at AAN, as well as the Council of Science Editors. We look forward to hearing about this work from the Coalition for Diversity and Inclusion in Scholarly Communications or C4DISC.
PATRICIA BASKIN: C4DISC believes that organizations and individuals working together can achieve DEI goals more quickly and through collaboration and sharing of data and resources.
PATRICIA BASKIN: So I'm going to talk about the mission of C4DISC, and also introduce the toolkits for equity projects. And give some very brief overviews of the four toolkits that have been published So far. C4DISC was founded by these 10 trade and professional associations that represent organizations and individuals working in scholarly communications.
PATRICIA BASKIN: We first met in June of 2017 to discuss our shared interest and felt that working together we'd be able to combine our resources and have a greater impact. A number of surveys in recent years have shed light that our industry scholarly communications are not a model for inclusivity. Publishing is truly a global enterprise, yet that diversity is not reflected in our collective demographics.
PATRICIA BASKIN: The mission of C4DISC is to work with organizations and individuals to build equity, inclusion, diversity and accessibility. And the vision is a socially just community. I'll let you read the rest of this when you go to the C4DISC website. The values include respect through valuing differences, listening and learning from different communities, and acting to eliminate barriers.
PATRICIA BASKIN: The goal of C4DISC, the overall goal, is to increase diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility in scholarly communications while valuing differences, welcoming diverse perspectives, learning from different communities, making space for marginalized voices, eliminating barriers and serving as allies. The goal is to provide education and tools that members and partners can use within their organizations for accomplishing this.
PATRICIA BASKIN: One of our first actions was to create a statement of principles. We invited other organizations to adopt these principles and have had numerous supportive sign ons. From the inception of C4DISC There was great interest in our community about how people and organizations could get involved, join or contribute to the work that we set out to do.
PATRICIA BASKIN: There are now several ways that individuals and organizations can participate in making our community more inclusive, equitable, diverse and accessible. Formal membership in C4DISC is offered for consortium members that represent the organizations and individuals who work in scholarly communications. We have a sliding scale fee structure for membership dues. Members appoint an official representative who participates in the governing body, which we refer to as the steering committee.
PATRICIA BASKIN: Organizations whose business or work is related to scholarly communications and who wish to support the work of C4DISC can get involved and have a voice in C4DISC initiatives directly as partners. Examples include publishers of all kinds, libraries, and industry suppliers. Three partnership levels have been established. Funds are used to support activities focused on DEIA in scholarly communications so that we can begin to find concrete solutions to the persistent problems in our communities.
PATRICIA BASKIN: Individuals and organizations can also contribute to the work of C4DISC by volunteering their time through working groups. Individuals are invited to join via general call for volunteers. Working groups are announced on our website and through our social media accounts. You don't have to be employed by a member organization to get involved.
PATRICIA BASKIN: And now I'd like to take you on a brief tour through our toolkits in the order that they were developed. We have published four, the anti-racism toolkit for allies, the anti-racism toolkit for organizations, the anti-racism toolkit for Black, Indigenous and People of Color, and the inclusive language and imagery guidelines for scholarly communications. We are working on a fifth toolkit right now, currently working on one on accessibility that's being developed with a goal of publishing it sometime this spring.
PATRICIA BASKIN: So we start with the anti-racism toolkit for allies. The first one developed by more than 50 volunteers from across scholarly publishing. This toolkit has been downloaded thousands of times since it was released. So what's in the toolkit? First, the developers felt that it was important to include a full catalog of laws, bills, and historical markers that created a system of structural racism in the United States.
PATRICIA BASKIN: But then the toolkit goes on to detail the following steps to becoming an ally. The major headings in the toolkit are becoming conscious of white advantage, listening to people of color without judgment or defensiveness. Moving out of social segregation And developing truth- Telling relationships of accountability,.
PATRICIA BASKIN: Taking action to interrupt racism and white privilege at all levels, And creating work communities where everyone thrives. So I'm going to touch on each of these five major steps that are detailed in much more detail in the toolkit. Becoming conscious of white advantage. When many of us think about inequality, we often think about marginalized groups and focus on them to see inequality.
PATRICIA BASKIN: But what about trying to see the advantages that dominant groups hold? The work of seeing the advantages granted by white privilege is a crucial step. So examples of several inequality examples are shown below, such as if I should move, I can be pretty sure of renting or purchasing a house in an area where I can afford. That's just one example.
PATRICIA BASKIN: White collaborators on this project shared by coming to terms with white advantage. It allows us to fully come to terms with our own race and see all the advantages that have existed throughout our lives and continue to play out day by day. And it allows us to start noticing racial dynamics on a regular basis and to start to be aware of our own role in these situations.
PATRICIA BASKIN: Step two - listening to Black, Indigenous and People of Color without judgment or defensiveness. This step means having those difficult conversations that include listening to how we all inadvertently perpetuate white privilege. That and listening to this and learning from it is a gift that can lead to personal growth and relationship building.
PATRICIA BASKIN: So we recommend staying away from any of the defensive or distancing tactics on the right and instead engaging in active listening with the LARA approach for receiving and giving feedback. So listening, affirming, responding and asking questions, much more detail in the actual too lkit on each of these. Step three -moving out of social segregation and developing truth telling relationships of accountability with diverse groups of people.
PATRICIA BASKIN: Some examples are, for instance, before conference travel, Considering who we reach out to for meetings and meals. There's many more examples and details in the actual toolkit. step four - taking advantage to interrupt racism and white advantage at all levels. This step emphasizes the intervention is both top down and bottom up simultaneously, as well as something that happens on an individual, interpersonal and community level.
PATRICIA BASKIN: Bystander intervention can play a key role in reducing trauma and reducing the impact of these incidents. And there are several examples here of interrupting racism and white advantage, many more and solutions in the actual toolkit. Creating work communities where everyone thrives. This step means examining work culture systems and workflows that may have white privilege culture embedded in them, even though it may take a lot of time and energy.
PATRICIA BASKIN: So here's a list of the white privilege characteristics that are all discussed. So there are paragraphs or discussions on any of them. All of them. The second tool kit developed was our anti-racism toolkit for organizers. This toolkit contains a huge amount of information for organizations who want to take a path toward anti-racism.
PATRICIA BASKIN: This path to becoming an anti-racist organization contains this cycle. There's a cycle of self assessing, implementing, planning, listening, measuring, learning, assembling, and all of these are really spelled out in detail. The path to becoming an anti-racist organization, for instance, includes a section on assessing where you are and it gives organizations, tools, charts and forms and steps to fill out to assess your current organization and your culture.
PATRICIA BASKIN: Assessing where you are then also the same for assessing your team, listening, learning and measuring, making a plan and implementing it and then repeating. Step three through five it. Taking action. Discussing how to go about crafting the DEI statement. Budgeting for DEI work. Creating support structure to support DEI work.
PATRICIA BASKIN: Creating responsibilities for a DEI officer. Consultant for human resources for the leadership or CEO of an organization setting up a committee or a task force. There are discussions about anti-racism, recruitment and hiring practices, establishing paid internships, supporting employee resources or affinity groups and mentorship programs, providing staff equity training and addressing microaggressions in the workplace, making performance evaluations equitable, supporting employee development plans, creating anti-racist leaders using measurements and metrics, defining organizational climate and culture, and identifying and overcoming biases.
PATRICIA BASKIN: So there are sections on each of these things that an organization can really sink their teeth into and work on. The third toolkit is the anti-racism toolkit for Black, Indigenous and People of Color. And this is different than the other toolkits and it is a resource for Black, Indigenous and People of Color. It is a resource to help them navigate academic publishing, to overcome barriers to entry into academic publishing, dealing with inaccessible resources, low salaries, marginal Black, Indigenous and People of Color, representation, limited membership and then creating community with and across groups discusses this in detail, including tips for day to day work for Black, Indigenous and People of Color.
PATRICIA BASKIN: Going to meetings, trying to how to assess the power structure, this sort of thing, and to find equality within communities. And then the final toolkit that we published, the latest toolkit is the inclusive language and imagery guidelines for scholarly communications. This toolkit is meant to be a comprehensive and global guideline to help authors, editors and reviewers recognize the use of language and images that are inclusive and culturally sensitive.
PATRICIA BASKIN: There are 10 language sections with then two additional separate sections for images and data visualization. Each of these language sections is presented on its own with resource lists for each. Each of them talks about the terminology in that particular area to avoid and terminology that is recommended. And this toolkit is to be updated annually with references and recommendations and resources as we receive feedback and as societal norms and language change.
PATRICIA BASKIN: The language guideline sections. Here's the list of all of them. And of course, there's great discussion after each one of them, general discussion, and then the preferred terms and avoiding terms. But the first 10 are our language resources and then the last two inclusive images and data visualization in addition to the actual language sections. An example would be the race and ethnicity section.
PATRICIA BASKIN: So it opens up with definitions of race, ethnicity and nationality, considering whether the context that wording is used and contributes to a stereotype avoiding generalizations, generalizations or vague terms, general discussions, and then talking about self identification. Working with language in first person fashion. First person fashion lists of terms to avoid with actual with some to use with caution.
PATRICIA BASKIN: And we have columns, an avoid column and a preferred column for language to actually use. So it's really a toolkit that editors can look at and reviewers and get specific guidance. And then there's a reference list for each of the sections, including the AMA, APA, multiple journalist and niche areas or general press guides. So a word about the toolkits in general, how to use them. These are meant to be training materials to help transform workplaces and organizational cultures.
PATRICIA BASKIN: They're for educational use. They're not intended as legal advice. They're published under a CC-BY-NC-SA license, which means that they're free to copy, to distribute in any medium, to reformat, to build upon, to reflect specific contexts or for specific organizations. Just as long as there's a link to the license, the appropriate credit is given to the original toolkit.
PATRICIA BASKIN: We at the AAN are creating a staff language and image guide now based on this particular guideline, and we are adapting it. So that we know that we're using language that is sensitive to neurologic patients and the physicians who care for them. There's no commercial use that is allowed. So in closing, we believe we can accelerate progress in making our world more equitable, inclusive, diverse and accessible by collaborating to develop and share resources and solutions.
PATRICIA BASKIN: So we invite you to use these toolkits, help us disseminate them in your own organizations and join us in future initiatives. Thank you very much.