Collaborative Research: Proposal for a SUMMIT to Plan a Conference Workshop for Minoritized Geoscientists

This project aims to host a four-day summit with fifteen leaders from Geoscience organizations with a demonstrated interest in improving belonging, accessibility, justice, equity, diversity, and inclusivity (BeAJEDI). The summit will provide these leaders with opportunities to share successful strategies for improving BeAJEDI in Geoscience. Leaders at the summit will design a conference where ~100-300 Geoscientists network, present their research, and share successful strategies for improving BeAJEDI in Geoscience.

The summit will thus begin the process of increasing interagency and interpersonal sharing, design, and refinement of the strategies used to strengthen BeAJEDI in Geoscience.

The main goal of this project is to host a four-day summit with 15 leaders from the largest and or influential Geoscience organizations with a demonstrated interest in improving belonging, accessibility, justice, equity, diversity, and inclusivity (BeAJEDI) in Geoscience. Summit participants will collaboratively design a conference workshop while sharing successful strategies for improving BeAJEDI for Geoscientists of Color.

This designed workshop will be primarily attended by Geoscientists and will allow attendees to present research and network. The workshop will also include surveying and interviewing attendees to collect information that are germane for successfully recruiting and retaining People of Color within Geoscience. The questions that the surveys and interviews seek to answer are:

1. What attracts People of Color to Geoscience? 2. What are the experiences of Geoscientists of Color?

3. What do full belonging, accessibility, justice, equity, diversity, and inclusivity look like to Geoscientists of Color?

Alongside developing a novel method of answering the questions listed above, this project's broader impacts are strengthened by including a mentorship component. The summit will pair early-career researchers interested in BeAJEDI issues with established and experienced individuals. The early-career researchers will gain conference proposal writing experience while expanding their network.

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.