CCS Working Toward Racial Justice

Working Toward Racial Justice

Overview

In early June, 2020, the Center for Community and Citizen Science acknowledged that while some of our ongoing work is explicitly oriented toward equity and social justice, we have also failed to advance equity and justice through the entirety of our work, particularly in the context of academia, which is inextricably linked to historical and ongoing marginalization of BIPOC. We have an obligation to examine our own work, our own everyday actions, and our institutional context, and identify ways that these perpetuate racism. We must examine our various forms of power, and find ways to use them against white supremacy. 

We created this space on our website as a way share our work to advance anti-racism. The posts below include:

We will continue to update this space as our work evolves. We welcome any resources and suggestions on how we can use our Center to advance anti-racism actions in the many areas that overlap with community science and citizen science, including conservation and natural resource management, STEM education in and out of schools, environmental justice, and community-based research and monitoring, agriculture, and sustainability. We also welcome your skepticism, your hard questions, and your critiques. We recognize that this work is critical, and are committed to a long-term process.

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Our Specific Commitments to Anti-Racism

July, 2020

Last month (June, 2020), the Center for Community and Citizen Science issued a statement committing to take action against racism in the work that we do. As promised in that statement, we have been working on more specific commitments, listed below, which will guide us in the months and years ahead. We intend for this touchstone document to evolve as we learn and grow, and hope that it may be useful to our community of collaborators and beyond.

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Working Toward Racial Justice

June 11, 2020

We at the Center for Community and Citizen Science are horrified and saddened by the most recent iterations of anti-Blackness and systemic racism in our society, our communities, and our institutions. While the events of recent weeks have laid bare their consequences, these systems have always existed in the United States. The murders of George Floyd, Nina Pop, Tony McDade, Breonna Taylor, and Ahmaud Arbery are only recent examples, among countless others, of Black people suffering under a centuries-old system of white supremacy.

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