ADVANCE Partnership: From the Classroom to the Field: Improving the Workplace in the Geosciences

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This project addresses the need for safe and productive STEM education and research workplaces for each and every person studying and working in STEM. The project will likely result in systemic change in the geosciences and may become a model for other STEM disciplines. The focus is on the geosciences because it includes field work expectations and is one of the least diverse of the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields. The project will develop bystander intervention workshops for department heads, chairs, and faculty to reduce incidents of sexual harassment and to properly handle it if it happens. The partners include experts from scientific and professional societies in geoscience, education, and professional development. The project team has experience leading successful professional development programs for faculty and early-career scientists. The project will transform teaching of research ethics of current and future geoscientists by addressing sexual harassment as scientific misconduct. The partnering organizations include: University of Wisconsin-Madison, Brown University, California State Los Angeles, Colorado College, University of California Merced, American Geophysical Union (AGU), Earth Science Women's Network (ESWN), and the Association for Women Geoscientists (AWG). The project will generate systemic change for gender equity in the geosciences through development of tested bystander intervention workshops for department heads, chairs, and faculty to appropriately respond to, prevent, and eliminate sexual harassment. The novel contributions of the proposed activities include: 1) Designing a community-based approach to bystander intervention training for women and men academic leaders; 2) Updating curriculum for the ethical conduct of research to include sexual harassment as scientific misconduct; and 3) Incorporating geoscience-relevant scenarios into training and teaching materials, including field research and educational settings. The project aims to improve workplace climate at the institutional level, structurally, and individually. At the institution level by directly addressing academic cultures through the leadership of scientific societies and institutions. At the structural level through policies and processes that guide professional conduct and response to misconduct. At the individual level through education and empowerment of women and men with strategies for intervening in various situations of misconduct. The training material will include attention to the unique challenges faced by women with intersectional identities. The collaborations with professional STEM society partners will facilitate national dissemination, implementation, and sustainability. The model developed and tested in this project will be shared as a model for other STEM disciplines and could result in broader systemic change in the culture of STEM.The NSF ADVANCE program is designed to foster gender equity through a focus on the identification and elimination of organizational barriers that impede the full participation and advancement of women faculty in academic institutions. Organizational barriers that inhibit equity may exist in policies, processes, practices, and the organizational culture and climate.