Blog

Diversify & Expand Governance & Community Support NAASC Contact: Joanna Friesner, Executive Director, arabidopsisconference@gmail.com Contributors: Anna Stepanova, Dior Kelley, Gloria Muday, Joanna Friesner The North American Arabidopsis Steering Committee (NAASC) is a small grassroots non-profit organization with one Executive Director (part-time, compensated) and 10 community-elected volunteer steering committee members. The Read more…

BSA Election Processes, Outcomes, and Recommendations for Reform Catrina Adams, Min Ya, Imeña Valdes, and Brenda Molano-Flores The Botanical Society of America’s capstone project is focused on improving our leadership election process.  Although as a society we have election-related bylaws, policies, and instructions that are codified and publicly available, the Read more…

Revising IS-MPMI Election Bylaws Roger Innes, Sonali Roy, Patricia Baldrich, Dennis Halterman The International Society for Molecular Plant-Microbe Interactions (IS-MPMI) is a community of researchers dedicated to advancing our understanding of plant-microbe interactions. To ensure the society’s leadership is inclusive and representative of its membership, a group of four members Read more…

Culturally Responsive Mentoring Laurie Smith, Mark Lubkowitz, John Fowler, Tessa Durham Brooks, Sylvia M. de Sousa, Marna Yandeau-Nelson The Maize Genetics Cooperation capstone project focused on the topic of “culturally responsive mentoring”. We chose this topic with the goal of promoting continued involvement of marginalized scientists in maize genetics via Read more…

The ROOT & SHOOT RCN has partnered with Movement Consulting to educate those with decision-making power within each organization about the complex issues that affect individuals’ sense of belonging and desire and ability to persist in plant science. This year-long training program culminated in organization-specific pilot programs (Capstone Projects) that Read more…

The overarching goal of the NSF RCN project is to change the culture of plant sciences so that barriers to inclusion and a sense of belonging are identified and eliminated. One of our strategies is to build alliances with organizations that support early career scientists with marginalized identities, e.g., SACNAS Read more…