Fieldwork Resources
To ensure the safety and equal treatment of researchers in the field
During fieldwork expeditions, participants are often isolated from standard social environments, support structures, and essential resources. As a result, researchers who are already vulnerable to discrimination, harassment, and violence may experience heightened risk in field work environments. Certain practices can and must be adopted by individual fieldwork teams and their institutions to ensure that all members conducting fieldwork are held accountable to a high standard of conduct. These measures aim to protect all researchers in the field and, if necessary, provide easily accessible pathways to report misconduct when it occurs. Here we have compiled resources that may be useful to gain new perspectives on fieldwork safety, and we will continue to add more resources as we at Scripps consider how best to support safe and healthy fieldwork practices.
Resources
Improve your leadership and communication skills! This training series will feature timely, challenging topics lead by subject matter experts, presented online in workshop format with opportunities to discuss scenarios, practice skills, and plan for your specific field projects and settings.
Source: UC Riverside
Certain individuals are more vulnerable to identity prejudice while conducting fieldwork. Here Demery & Pipkin provide strategies for fieldwork groups to understand and minimize risk for all field workers.
Source: Science (requires access)
It is essential for institutions to form proactive strategies to address discrimination and racialized violence in the field. Here are ten steps to support the safety of BIPOC field workers.
Source: EOS
Researchers with disabilities face many challenges in the geoscience community, both from fieldwork circumstances and institutional barriers. “Flexible fieldwork options and more thoughtful recruitment efforts will better open our community to the diverse talent it needs.”
Source: EOS
Historically, Antarctic science and exploration has been associated with an image of heroic white male leadership. The gendered nature of Antarctic narratives has led to challenges for women in Antarctic research, ranging from physical barriers to persistent sexual harassment. Here, Nash et al. present results from a qualitative survey of women’s experiences conducting Antarctic fieldwork.
Source: PLOS ONE
URGE invites geoscientists to participate in discussions and develop plans to unlearn racism at the institutional level. Here is the SIO URGE pod safety plan formulated by Scripps faculty and students. (Documents are not official Scripps statements.) See other SIO URGE pod deliverables here: https://urgeoscience.org/pods/scripps-institution-of-oceanography/
Source: URGE