Introduction

Our preliminary Code of Conduct follows. We see this as a living document that we will update based on the needs of our community. We will invite Data Science by Design (DSxD) participants to add to this draft to ensure that they have some ownership over the expectations for their community.

Our goal is to create the most constructive and supportive community possible. We want every member of the DSxD community to be able to focus their full attention on becoming better at communicating their data science ideas (best practices, methodology, and cultural change within the field) through creative means both at DSxD events and beyond. This is impossible to do if you are being harassed, stalked, or discriminated against.

Accordingly, all DSxD participants are expected to show respect and courtesy to each other and to those outside the community. This includes during participation in an event, discussion, or meeting hosted by DSxD and in external events, discussions, and meetings.

To make sure that everyone has a common understanding of what it means to treat others with respect and courtesy,we have adopted the following code of conduct. The code of conduct is enforced by DSxD leadership.

Unacceptable behavior

The following types of behavior are unacceptable at DSxD, both online and in-person, and constitute code of conduct violations.

Abusive behavior

• Harassment—including offensive verbal comments related to gender, sexual orientation, disability, physical appearance, body size, race, or religion, as well as sexual images in public spaces, deliberate intimidation, stalking, following, harassing photography or recording, inappropriate physical contact, and unwelcome sexual or romantic attention.
• Threats—threatening someone physically or verbally. For example, threatening to publicize sensitive information about someone’s personal life.

Unwelcoming behavior

• Blatant -isms—saying things that are explicitly racist, sexist, homophobic, etc. For example, arguing that some people are less intelligent because of their gender, race or religion. Subtle -isms and small mistakes made in conversation are not code of conduct violations. However, repeating something after it has been pointed out to you that you broke a social rule, or antagonizing or arguing with someone who has pointed out your subtle -ism is considered unwelcoming behavior, and is not allowed at DSxD.
• Maliciousness towards other DSxD members— deliberately attempting to make others feel bad, name-calling, singling out others for derision or exclusion. For example, telling someone they’re not a real programmer or that they don’t belong at DSxD.
• Being especially unpleasant— for example, if we’ve received reports from multiple participants of annoying, rude, or especially distracting behavior.

Enforcement

If we witness or receive a report about abusive behavior, we will contact the perpetrator to have a conversation with them and verify what has transpired, and they will be removed from the DSxD community.

This protocol (See Response Protocol below) will be used by our committee to respond to reports of code of conduct violations.

Reporting

If you see a violation of our code of conduct, please report here and/or contact us at datasciencebydesign@gmail.com

Why should I report?

• You are responsible for making DSxD a safe and comfortable space for everyone. Everyone in our community shares this responsibility. DSxD leadership are not around all spaces at all times, so we cannot enforce the code of conduct without your help.
• The consequences of not reporting bad behavior for the DSxD community outweigh the consequences of reporting for the one reported person. Think beyond “I don’t want X person to meet consequences because I told someone about their bad behavior.” Consider the impact on everyone else at DSxD of letting their behavior continue unchecked.
• DSxD can only work as a self-directed community because of shared trust between its members. Reporting code of conduct violations helps us identify when this trust is broken to prevent that from happening in the future.

Where and how to report

Please report all code of conduct violations using the form here. If you would rather discuss the matter in person with a member of the DSxD leadership email us datasciencebydesign@gmail.com to schedule a time to talk.

In your report, please include:

• Your name— this is necessary for us to be able to follow up with you, and ask questions to better understand the situation. We will also ask for your contact information. The Google Form will allow you to report anonymously, but please only use this option if you really need to, and please understand that we might not be able to take action to help without knowing who you are.
• A detailed description of what happened. (If possible) If the violation happened online, please link to or send us the relevant text. Where and when the incident happened
• Any other relevant context. Do you have examples of a pattern of similar behavior from this person before? Do you have a relationship with this person outside of DSxD?
• If/how you’ve already responded— this lets us know the current state of the situation.

Confidentiality

We will keep all reports confidential, except if we’ve discussed with you and agreed otherwise. When we discuss incidents with people who are reported, we will anonymize details as much as we can to protect reporter privacy.

However, some incidents happen in one-on-one interactions, and even if the details are anonymized, the reported person may be able to guess who made the report. If you have concerns about retaliation or your personal safety, and do not want us to share the details of your report with anyone (including the perpetrator) please let us know explicitly in your report. Unfortunately, in that situation we will not be able to take any action.

In some cases we may decide to share an update about a major incident with members. If that’s the case, the identities of all victims and reporters will remain confidential unless those individuals instruct us otherwise.

Social rules

In addition to having a code of conduct, we have lightweight social rules that were developed by the Recurse center. The social rules are different and separate from the code of conduct. They help us create a better learning environment by giving names to counterproductive behavior and acting as a release valve so that frustration doesn’t build up over time. We expect people to unintentionally break the social rules from time to time. Doing this doesn’t make you a bad person. When this happens, apologize and move on.

The enforcement provisions in this code of conduct do not apply to the social rules. We definitely won’t give you a strong warning or expel you from the community for breaking a social rule. If you have any questions about any part of the code of conduct or social rules, please reach out to any of the DSxD leaders.

Response Protocol

When a report is submitted through the submission form, an email alert will be sent to a shared inbox that the DSxD leadership have access to. There is always one designated person responsible for handling incoming requests.

During an event: We will respond within a few hours and try to expedite the process as much as possible. Depending on the severity of the behavior, the accused member will likely be removed from event activities before we can go through a thorough processing of the accusation.

Outside of event: Within two business days of receiving an email alert, a member of the DSxD leadership will:

1. Read the report to determine whether there has been a code of conduct violation.

• If not, they will reply to the reporter, explain that our code of conduct was not violated, and suggest other remediation options (e.g. talking with us to get advice on how to resolve an interpersonal conflict).
• If yes, the DSxD leadershipwill determine whether they are the best people to respond to the situation, or if it is more appropriate to hand off the report to another leader (for example, if someone else already has a relationship with the reporter or the accused).

2. Follow up with the reporter:

• We’ll email to acknowledge that we’ve received the report and are taking action.
• We’ll ask any follow-up questions we need to better understand the situation.
• We’ll confirm that we can contact the accused individual.

3. Follow up with the community individual who violated our code of conduct:

• We will reach out to the individual over email, let them know that we’ve received a report of a code of conduct violation, and invite them to speak to us about the incident.
• If the report was of abusive behavior, or the second report of unwelcoming behavior:
  • during our meeting we will tell the individual we’re removing them from the community, and remove their access to DSxD events and communication platforms.
• If the report was of unwelcoming behavior:
  • we will explain how their behavior violates our code of conduct and what we expect of them moving forward and
  • we will warn them that a second code of conduct violation will result in them being removed from the DSxD community

If a report is made anonymously without an email address provided for follow-up, or if the reporter indicates that they do not give us permission to act on their report, we will unfortunately not be able to take any action.

License

The DSxD code of conduct is available under the terms of the CC0 license. It is adapted from the code of conduct developed by the Recurse Center. Parts of it are also based on the !!Con Code of Conduct, the PyCon 2013 Code of Conduct, and the example conference anti-harassment policy on the Geek Feminism Wiki, created by the Ada Initiative and other volunteers. The !!Con Code of Conduct and the Geek Feminism conference anti-harassment policy are available under the terms of the CC0 license. The PyCon 2013 Code of Conduct is available under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.

Last updated 2020-03-14