HOW TO BUILD MORE INCLUSIVE AND WELCOMING COGNITIVE SCIENCE? AN INTERGENERATIONAL CROWD-SOURCING SESSION Contact: [email protected]; [email protected] Date & Time: Wednesday July 29, 4:00PM – 5:30PM EDT About: This Affinity Group will crowd-source concrete “tips and tricks” that members of our community (trainees, faculty, etc) have used within their professional lives for making their mentorship and research more inclusive to members of underrepresented and minoritized communities. The motivation for this session is unprecedented historical and currently lived events (#metoo, #BLM, #covid19), which have cast a stark light on the urgent need to identify and remediate systemic barriers to inclusivity and access within all facets of our society, including academia. These range from active bias and geopolitical issues to sensory-motor disability barriers. In our own discipline, cognitive science, some progress has been made with respect to dedicated groups of scholars coming together to form professional societies whose missions are to address systemic barriers (e.g., Women in Cognitive Science in 2001, Women in Cognitive Science Canada in 2016, SPARK Society in 2019). However, the recognition of such barriers is not enough to create actionable change that all of us, as individuals, can readily incorporate within our classrooms, laboratories, and scholarship. Thus, our desired outcome will be a comprehensive list of ideas and resources that the SPARK Society and Women in Cognitive Science Canada will share broadly with the cognitive science community and continue to update at its websites. Questions/comments will come from conference attendees, particularly trainees, who can also submit contributions anonymously ahead of time (please see link below). Our ultimate goal is to increase a collective sense of welcoming and belonging in our discipline. Please share your thoughts ahead of the meeting by completing this short form: https://forms.gle/yYtoaE4bgkRrumZw8
