Planning Grant: From Classroom to career: Building a Culture of Access for Geoscientists with Disabilities

在地球科学领域，残疾被视为事业成功的障碍，以及难以接近的学位课程文化，使许多残疾人不愿开始或继续攻读地球科学学位课程。持有科学、技术、工程和数学（STEM）学科学位的残疾人的失业率也明显高于非残疾同龄人（NCSES， 2021年）。除非普遍存在的“难以接近”的文化有所改变，并使残疾地球科学家的支持和成功正常化，否则许多人将继续被排除在地球科学之外。今天的残疾早期职业地球科学家是“美国残疾人法一代”的先锋，他们出生于1990年《美国残疾人法》通过后。《美国残疾人法》一代不仅希望有无障碍的学习和工作条件，他们还期望有这样的条件。随着ADA一代的成年，需要更好地描述地球科学中所有职业阶段的残疾经历（见Kingsbury et al， 2020）。我们也迫切需要审视残疾人身份中的偏见和种族主义。虽然准入障碍影响着我们所有人，但种族主义加剧了残疾BIPOC个体所面临的偏见（例如Garcia， 2019），但人们（除了轶事证据）对这如何影响地球科学领域的学生和职业专业人士知之甚少。该项目的领导者旨在征求来自不同背景、不同职业阶段和工作部门的地球科学家的意见，并与他们建立社区。拥有不同学术经历和人生道路的残疾地球科学家意识到，要改变地球科学文化，残疾科学家需要的不仅仅是轶事和个人倡导。这项计划资助的目标是促进这种文化变革，首先通过调查社区内的残疾地球科学家，确定和描述残疾人在地球科学职业道路上面临的重大障碍，然后通过与国家地球科学会议相关联的混合研讨会，制定具体的倡议，以解决这些障碍。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

In the geosciences, the perception of disability as a barrier to a successful career and the inaccessible culture of degree programs discourage many people with disabilities from starting or staying in geoscience degree programs. Disabled degree-holding individuals in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) disciplines also have a significantly higher unemployment rate than their non-disabled peers (NCSES, 2021). Until there is change in the prevailing culture of inaccessibility and normalize the support and success of disabled geoscientists, there will be continued exclusion of many from the geosciences. Today’s disabled early career geoscientists are the vanguard of the ‘ADA generation’, born after the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990. The ADA generation doesn’t just hope for accessible learning and work conditions, they expect it. As the ADA generation comes of age, there is need of better characterization of the disabled experience in the geosciences across all career stages (see Kingsbury et al, 2020). There is also a compelling need to examine the biases and racism within the Disabled identity. While access barriers impact us all, racism compounds the biases faced by disabled BIPOC individuals (e.g. Garcia, 2019), yet little is known (outside of anecdotal evidence) about how that impacts students and career professionals in the geosciences. The leaders of this project aim to solicit input from - and build community with - geoscientists from diverse backgrounds, all career stages, and work sectors.Disabled geoscientists with diverse academic experiences and life paths are realizing disabled scientists need more than anecdotes and individual advocacy to transform the culture of geosciences. The goal of this planning grant is to facilitate this culture change by first identifying and characterizing significant barriers faced by people with disabilities on geoscience career paths by surveying disabled geoscientists within the community and then strategizing specific initiatives that could address those barriers via a hybrid workshop attached to a national geoscience conference.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.