NOTE: PLEASE UPDATE THIS FOR YOUR OWN REPO
Code of Conduct, commonly abbreviated as “CoC”, is a set of rules outlining the social norms, rules, & responsibilities of an individual project, party or organization.
This is an example of a Code of Conduct (CoC) provided as a starting point for an open source project. When reusing this repo, you should edit and adapt this to meet the needs of your specific team. If you want to apply an institutional CoC to a project repo make sure that all members involved are employees of the same organisation, such as for the Turing. When external members are involved, you might want to use a hybrid approach, as used by the Open Research Community Management Team. There are many more examples to choose from, so please also check other sources.
This Code of Conduct document outlines our expectations for participants within the team as well as this online repository (project). We also provide steps to reporting any concern, uncomfortable situation or unacceptable behaviour by other participants. We are committed to providing a welcoming, collaborative and inspiring experience for all and expect our code of conduct to be honoured.
The Code of Conduct used in this document is selected from the options provided by GitHub that reuses Contributor Covenant's version (add a new file -> name that CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md -> click on 'Choose a code of conduct template' -> select from the options that best suits the requirements in your project).
We have further adopted the language and content that reflects our values and needs in the project. To learn more about why we recommend creating a CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md file, please read the Participation Guidelines chapter in The Turing Way Guide for Project Design. It is recommended to select and adapt a well established Code of Conduct. Many openly developed projects have a Code of Conduct in place that often is openly licensed and can be re-used and adapted for your project. The Turing Way Code of Conduct is one example of a Code of Conduct built on various existing ones and can be adapted further.
We encourage everyone to participate and are committed to building a project for all. Although we will fail at times, we seek to treat everyone both as fairly and equally as possible. Whenever a member has made a mistake, we expect them to take responsibility for it. If someone has been harmed or offended, it is our responsibility to listen carefully and respectfully, and do our best to right the wrong.
Although this list cannot be exhaustive, we explicitly honour diversity in age, gender, gender identity or expression, culture, ethnicity, language, national origin, political beliefs, profession, race, religion, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, and technical ability. We will not tolerate discrimination based on any of the protected characteristics above, including participants with any visible or invisible disabilities.
Examples of behaviour that contributes to a positive environment for our community include:
- Demonstrating empathy and kindness toward other people
- Being respectful of differing opinions, viewpoints, and experiences
- Giving and gracefully accepting constructive feedback
- Accepting responsibility and apologizing to those affected by our mistakes, and learning from the experience
- Focusing on what is best not just for us as individuals, but for the overall community
Examples of unacceptable behaviour include:
- Trolling, insulting or derogatory comments, and personal or political attacks
- Public or private harassment
- Publishing others' private information, such as a physical or email address, without their explicit permission
- Other conduct which could reasonably be considered inappropriate in a professional setting
- The use of sexualised language or imagery, and sexual attention or advances of any kind
This Code of Conduct applies to all members participating in the activities, events and processes taking place within the scope of this repository. Specifically, our Code of Conduct applies to any conduct:
- in interactions within the team/community maintaining this repo
- at any team activity, communication or event related to this repo
- outside the team activity when a team member is representing this project
- by members outside the team engaging on this GitHub repository.
This Code of Conduct also applies when an individual is officially representing the community in public spaces. Examples of representing our community include using an official e-mail address, posting via an official social media account, or acting as an appointed a representative at an online or offline event.
Instances of harassing, abusive, or otherwise unacceptable behaviour should be reported to the community leaders responsible for enforcement.
All reports will be reviewed and investigated promptly and fairly.
All community leaders are obligated to respect the privacy and security of the reporter of any incident. Together we strive to foster an environment where everyone feels valued, respected, and included.
Community leaders are responsible for clarifying and enforcing our standards of acceptable behaviour and will take appropriate and fair corrective, restorative and action in response to any behaviour that they deem inappropriate, threatening, offensive, or harmful.
Community leaders have the right and responsibility to remove, edit, or reject comments, commits, code, wiki edits, issues, and other contributions that are not aligned to this Code of Conduct, and will communicate reasons for moderation decisions when appropriate.
If you experience or witness unacceptable behaviour, or have any other concerns, please report it by contacting the Team Lead. For this template repo related communications, please email Malvika Sharan ([email protected]).
When reusing this repo please replace information by adding NAME AND CONTACT INFORMATION appropriate for your project..
To report an issue involving the team lead, please email directly to the Programme Lead. For this template repo related communications, please email Kirstie Whitaker ([email protected]).
When reusing this repo please replace information by adding NAME AND CONTACT INFORMATION appropriate for your project..
In your report please include:
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Your contact information.
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Names (real, nicknames, or pseudonyms) of any individuals involved. If there are additional witnesses, please include them as well. Your account of what occurred, and if you believe the incident is ongoing. If there is a publicly available record (e.g. a mailing list archive or a public IRC logger), please include a link.
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Any additional information that may be helpful.
We will respect confidentiality requests all the time for the purpose of protecting individuals who have been harmed.
- Reporter: Person reporting an incident.
- Reportee: Person being reported.
After receiving a report, the community leaders (or person handling the report), team lead or programme director in this case, will review the incident report and follow this process to determine the cause and consequences that violated this Code of Conduct and take further actions:
Community leaders will reach out to the reporter to ask for further information if the submitted report is not complete or needs some additional context. Community leaders will also ensure that person impacted or harmed by the reported incident is safe and identify how they can be further supported.
A meeting with the reportee will be scheduled where the person handling the report will discuss four questions:
- What happened?
- What were you thinking at the time?
- Who has been affected by what you have done? In what way?
- What do you think you need to do to make things right?
When the incident in question inflicted harm on another person, additional questions will be asked on behalf of the person(s) harmed:
- What did you think when you realized what had happened?
- What impact has this incident had on you and others?
- What do you think needs to happen to make things right?
The person handling the report may follow up with reportee or reporter after this discussion with any additional questions to help them reach a resolution.
Here are examples of possible resolutions to a report. This list is not comprehensive, and any action necessary to reach a fair resolution will be taken as needed. Possible resolutions to an incident include:
- a private communication from community leaders, providing clarity around the nature of the violation and an explanation of why the behaviour was inappropriate.
- an apology to the person harmed or the team as a whole
- an action plan for the reportee to improve their awareness and correct future behaviours
- if confirmed by the person reporting, reportee will have no interaction with the people involved, including unsolicited interaction with those enforcing the Code of Conduct, for a specified period. This includes avoiding interactions in community spaces as well as external channels like social media.
- not publishing the content that violated the Code of Conduct, until necessary changes have been made and agreed upon by the person handling the report.
- An imposed suspension, such as asking reportee to “take a week off” from the GitHub repo or team activity.
- a stronger warning with consequences for continued behaviour.
The person handling the report will maintain records of all reports so that they may be reviewed if stronger measures are required when repeated violations occur by the same individual as well as to improve our Code of Conduct for future participation.
Once a resolution is agreed upon, but before it is enacted, the person handling the report will contact the reporter and any other affected parties to explain the proposed resolution. They will ask if this resolution is acceptable and must note feedback for the record. However, they are not required to act on this feedback.
The reportee will be contacted via email informing them of the resolution. A final meeting may be conducted if necessary.
All reports will be kept confidential with details shared only with people involved in report handling. If a person handling the report (team lead or programme director) is linked with the ongoing issue, they will declare their Conflict of Interest and remove themselves from any discussion related to the report handling. Resolution action may also include identifying appropriate members from within the Open Research Community Building Team if more support for the person handling the report is needed.
This code of conduct is based on the Open Code of Conduct from the TODO Group, The Carpentries Code of Conduct and Contributor Covenant version 2.0.
The report handling process has been derived from the Eastern University Academic Charter School (EUACS) Student Restorative Justice based Code of Conduct derived from the work of Ted Wachtel at International Institute for Restorative Practices (IIRP). Restorative Practice Principles are based on Amstutz and Mullet (2005). Restorative Discipline for Schools, pp. 25-26.
Community Impact Guidelines are inspired by Mozilla's code of conduct enforcement ladder.