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UC3 Code of Conduct

As part of the California Digital Library (CDL), the University of California Curation Center (UC3) works to advance digital curation services and practices throughout the UC system and beyond.  To achieve our goals, the UC3 team routinely partners with external collaborators.  Our partners represent a mixture of professionals from all over the world who are working to provide transformative digital preservation, persistent identifier, data publishing, and research data management systems, services, and initiatives that sustain and promote open scholarship.

Diversity of experience, perspective, and background is one of our strengths, but it can also lead to communication challenges. To that end, we ask our team members and our partners  to adhere to a few ground rules as we work together. 

We enjoy partnering with other groups and know that our projects are all stronger when we work together. Therefore, this is not an exhaustive list of things that we can’t do. Rather, please take these guidelines in the spirit in which they’re intended – a guide to make it easier to enrich all of us and the communities in which we participate.

This code of conduct applies to all spaces managed by UC3, which include Slack, Github, events, meetings, and other forums created by the project teams that are  used for communication. In addition, violations of this code outside our discrete UC3 spaces are also unacceptable because they may also affect a person’s ability to participate within them.

  • Be friendly and positive. Discussions and collaborations are easier and more successful when they happen among positive and open-minded people who share knowledge generously and look to learn from others’ experience and perspective. 
  • Be welcoming. We strive to be welcoming and supportive to people of all backgrounds and identities. This includes, but is not limited to members of any race, ethnicity, culture, national origin, color, immigration status, social and economic class, educational level, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, age, size, family status, political belief, religion, and mental and physical ability.
  • Be considerate. Your work will be used by other people, and you in turn will depend on the work of others. Any decision you take will affect users and colleagues, and you should take those consequences into account when making decisions. Remember that UC3 projects affect a diverse and worldwide community, so you might not be communicating in someone else’s primary language.
  • Be respectful. Not all of us will agree all the time, but disagreement is no excuse for poor behavior and poor manners. We might all experience some frustration now and then, but we cannot allow that frustration to turn into a personal attack. It’s important to remember that a community where people feel uncomfortable or threatened is not a productive one. Members of the UC3 team and our partners should be respectful when dealing with each other as well as with people outside the community.
  • Be careful in the words that you choose. We are a community of professionals, and we conduct ourselves professionally. Be kind to others. Do not insult or put down other participants. Harassment and other exclusionary behavior aren’t acceptable. This includes, but is not limited to:
    • Violent threats or language directed against another person
    • Discriminatory jokes and language
    • Posting sexually explicit or violent material
    • Posting (or threatening to post) other people’s personally identifying information (“doxing”)
    • Personal insults, especially those using racist or sexist terms
    • Unwelcome sexual attention
    • Advocating for, or encouraging, any of the above behavior
    • Repeated harassment of others. In general, if someone asks you to stop, then stop
  • When we disagree, listen patiently to other opinions and try to understand why. Disagreements, both social and technical, happen all the time and we are no exception. It is important that we resolve disagreements and differing views constructively. Remember that we are all different people and we have different perspectives on issues. Being unable to understand why someone holds a viewpoint doesn’t mean that they’re wrong. Don’t forget that it is human to err and blaming each other doesn’t get us anywhere. Instead, focus on helping to resolve issues and learning from mistakes.

Contact UC3 Leadership

If you believe someone is violating the code of conduct, we ask that you report it by emailing one or more member of UC3 leadership team:

We also would like to recognize the hard work and offer our appreciation to the authors of the Django Code of Conduct and DMPRoadmap Code of Conduct.  Much of the text above was derived from their work.

FAQ

This FAQ attempts to address common questions and concerns around this Code of Conduct. If you still have questions after reading it, please feel free to contact us.

Why have you adopted a Code of Conduct?

We think the UC3 team is awesome and working at the California Digital Library is awesome. If you’re familiar with us, you’ll probably notice that the Code basically matches what we already do.  While we have employee guidelines regarding acceptable behavior in our workplace, we think of this as additional documentation that is necessary for our communities: we want to  take implicit expectations about behavior and make them explicit, especially when we work with others outside our team.

We’re doing this because we continually engage in partnerships with other organizations and institutions within the UC system, nationally and internationally.   This is on balance a very positive thing, but as we initiate partnerships, build out relationships, and engage in work together, we think it’s very important to be clear about our values.

We know that our team is open, friendly, and welcoming. We want to make sure everyone else knows it too.

What does it mean to “adopt” a Code of Conduct?

For the most part, we don’t think it means large changes. We think that the text does a really good job describing the way the UC3 team and our partners already conduct themselves. We expect that most people will simply continue to behave in the awesome way they have for years.

However, we do expect that people will abide by the spirit and words of the CoC when in “official” partnership spaces, both private and public. 

In practice, this means mailing lists (EZID-users, DMPAdmin, etc.), the various UC3 slack channels (#uc3, #uc3-dev, etc.), issue tracking and code review tools, and “official”  ceremonies such as sprint reviews and retros. 

This Code of Conduct is about saying that we will be open, friendly, and welcoming. The core issue is about ensuring the conversations we have are productive and inviting for all.

What happens if someone violates the Code of Conduct?

Our intent is that anyone in the community can stand up for this code, and direct people who are unaware to this document. If that doesn’t work, or if you need more help, you can contact us. 

Why do we need a Code of Conduct? Everyone knows not to be a jerk.

Sadly, not everyone knows this.  However, even if everyone was kind, everyone was compassionate, and everyone was familiar with codes of conduct, it would still be incumbent upon us to publish our own. Maintaining a code of conduct forces us to consider and articulate what kind of community we want to be, and serves as a constant reminder to put our best foot forward. But most importantly, it serves as a signpost to people looking to partner with us that we feel these values are important.

How does this relate to CDL and other UC teams?

This Code of Conduct is not intended to supersede or interfere with similar UC or CDL policies. The UC3 team has several partnerships and we just want to clarify, in our own words, how we expect our team and our partners to work and interact.  For more information on UC’s standards for ethical conduct, please refer to the UCOP website for a thorough guidance on the ethical, legal and professional behavior in all dealings inside and outside the University.