AY 2022-2023

• CWS Leadership invested in the DEI Committee’s work by creating 2 opportunities for paid student assistants to facilitate goals and projects that needed more attention. These funds came directly from Jay Lund (Vice Director) and the California Institute for Water Resources. We are excited by the progress boost this provided us!
• Updated CWS DEI webpage to include refreshed content – Including revisiting committee and leadership goals for DEI in CWS, revising associated actions and specific objectives to align with 2023-24 goals, and adding AY 2020-21, 2021-22, 2022-23 completed projects to increase accessibility to the content. We invite you to explore our new page: CWS Diversity, Equity, and Inclusivity

Internal Culture

• Continued biweekly committee meetings with engaged early-career members and members of CWS leadership and the PI group.
• Held a training seminar for the CWS community, facilitated by the UCD DEI office.
  • Winter 2023: Intercultural Communication and Competence
• Convened a monthly book club to read and discuss a book selected by the Campus Community Book Project: “Defund Fear” by Zach Norris.
• Continued to provide free menstrual products for downstairs restrooms (see CA Legislative Assembly Bill #367).
• Broadcasted campus opportunities for additional DEI engagement (e.g., screened lecture by Dr. Robin Wall Kimmerer: "The Fortress, The River, and The Garden: A New Metaphor for Knowledge Symbiosis").

Outreach

• Taught two days of marsh science at Fairfield High School; demonstrating methods for catching fish, identifying birds, measuring water quality, and lessons on marsh biodiversity and its importance to the local ecosystem. See our California WaterBlog, Marsh on the move: bringing environmental education into the classroom, for a recap!
• Supported NorCal Resist with a holiday food drive.
• Several watershed members continued with Letters to a Pre-Scientist (a STEM program for elementary students) and Skype-a-Scientist.
• Thanks to the external support from the California Institute for Water Resources, we were able to purchase key outreach supplies. This allows us to be more self-sufficient while offering a wider variety of outreach events in future. 

Hiring Practices

• Continued to widely circulate job postings to multiple UC and CSU campuses, ecological and freshwater scientific society job boards, social media, the website front page, and directly to various departments and organizations catered to the content of each ad. CWS remains cognizant of using inclusive language in advertisements and reviews applicants holistically.

At the Institute level, we are pleased the Institute of the Environment has: 

• Supported us in refining language in job position postings to ensure inclusivity.
• Underwent branding change – John Muir Institute of the Environment (JMIE) is now Institute of the Environment (IE); this includes new logos released earlier this calendar year. If you notice the old name or logo on any websites or building decor please reach out to CWS' current Communications Facilitator.