2018 Webinar Series
Emerging global issues such as climate change, loss of biological diversity, energy alternatives, conserving land and water resources, and sustainable agriculture, require more reliance on a workforce with training and expertise in biodiversity science. As a community of biodiversity scientists, we need to identify best practices to support the training and development of a set of diverse, competent, and engaged young biologists who are well-prepared for careers that will be generating and utilizing biodiversity data. Increasing human diversity within the biodiversity sciences will have a broad positive impact on the advancement of biodiversity sciences, creativity in biodiversity research, and sustainability of research efforts.
As a first step towards identifying those best practices and synergizing current efforts, Biodiversity Literacy in Undergraduate Education (BLUE), the iDigBio Education and Outreach Working Group, Biodiversity Collections Network (BCoN), and the Small Collections Network (SCNet) are collaborating on a 2018 webinar series that will highlight current initiatives, existing resources, effective practice, and emerging professionals that are leading the way in broadening diversity across the biodiversity sciences field and beyond. All of the webinar speakers will be asked to focus on metrics and assessment so we can begin to understand what the baseline is for the biodiversity community. The goals of this Broadening Participation series are to start a conversation to:
- Increase awareness of existing efforts and initiatives
- encourage collaboration among professionals who are making efforts to broaden participation
- Engage new partners from all areas of science to foster communication from across fields, domains, and societies
- Identify effective goals, vetted assessments, and successful strategies to broaden participation.
Coming Up
We are taking a break over the summer but look out for more webinars in the fall!
Past
Moving the Needle for Women: Addressing Sexual Assault and Harassment in Science - May 9
Broadening Participation of People with Disabilities in Science - April 11
Digital Collections as a Tool for Increasing Diversity in our Community - March 7
Broadening Participation to Juveniles in Detention and Those Recently Released - February 16
