To be effective, the members of the ORCA community must work together; our code of conduct lays down the rules for our cooperative efforts and applies to everyone.
This isn’t an exhaustive list of things that you can’t do. Rather, take it in the spirit in which it’s intended - a guide to make it easier to enrich all of us and the technical communities in which we participate.
This code of conduct applies to all spaces managed by ORCA or the Vermont Research Open source Office (VERSO). This includes IRC, the mailing lists, the issue tracker,events, and any other forums created by the project team which the community uses for communication. In addition, violations of this code outside these spaces may affect a person's ability to participate within them.
If you believe someone is violating the code of conduct, we ask that you report it to the Director of Compliance Services and Chief Privacy Officer, Office of Audit, Compliance and Privacy Services: (802) 656-3086 compliance@uvm.edu
THIS IS A SUMMARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF VERMONT’S CODE OF CONDUCT AND ETHICAL STANDARDS. FOR A COPY OF THE FULL CODE, PLEASE VISIT go.uvm.edu/codeofconduct
The University of Vermont is committed to continually strengthening its ethical culture. From the University’s motto of “Studiis et Rebus Honestis” (Integrity in Theoretical and Practical Pursuits) to our values stated in “Our Common Ground”, we are all expected to perform our jobs and to conduct business in an ethical and compliant manner. All University personnel have a shared responsibility to the University, to those we serve, to our community and to each other.
(“Code”) is a tool to help you comply with legal and regulatory requirements and with University policies and procedures. The Code is designed to help you make ethical choices when and if you are faced with a difficult decision or situation.
The full Code applies to all University of Vermont personnel. Personnel includes, but is not limited to, faculty, staff, volunteers, student employees, and individuals hired or contracted to perform a function that is generally associated with an employment relationship (i.e., temporary employee, student employees). This Code also applies to all those attending a UVM hosted, sponsored or internal event.
Real or suspected violations of legal and regulatory requirements (laws, acts, statutes, regulations), policies and procedures, and/or professional standards. Fraudulent or dishonest conduct resulting in violation of law or University policy.
The University has established a robust compliance reporting system made up of several reporting mechanisms. For more information on available reporting mechanisms, review the Whistleblower Policy: Reporting, Protections, & Non-Retaliation policy.
The University prohibits retaliation or retribution for a good faith report, for supporting a person who files a good faith report, or for participating in an investigation of a report. Refer to the Whistleblower Policy: Reporting, Protections, & Non-Retaliation policy for more information.
The President of the Unversity of Vermont is the official responsible for the interpretation and administration of the Code.
Above and beyond the requirements from the University of Vermont Code of Conduct we include the following:
We strive to be a community that welcomes and supports people of all backgrounds and identities. This includes, but is not limited to members of any race, ethnicity, culture, national origin, colour, immigration status, social and economic class, educational level, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, age, size, family status, political belief, religion, and mental and physical ability.
We are a group of students, professionals, researchs, volunteers all with different amounts of time to give, expertise and lives that influence each of us. Take a second to be curious, not judgemental and reach out to help rather than critisize.
Your work will be used by other people, and you in turn will depend on the work of others. Any decision you take will affect users and colleagues, and you should take those consequences into account when making decisions. Remember that we're a world-wide community, so you might not be communicating in someone else's primary language.
Not all of us will agree all the time, but disagreement is no excuse for poor behavior and poor manners. We might all experience some frustration now and then, but we cannot allow that frustration to turn into a personal attack. It’s important to remember that a community where people feel uncomfortable or threatened is not a productive one. Members of the ORCA community should be respectful when dealing with other members as well as with people outside the community.
Do not insult or put down other participants. Harassment and other exclusionary behavior aren't acceptable. This includes, but is not limited to:
- Violent threats or language directed against another person.
- Discriminatory jokes and language.
- Posting sexually explicit or violent material.
- Posting (or threatening to post) other people's personally identifying information ("doxing").
- Personal insults, especially those using racist or sexist terms.
- Unwelcome sexual attention.
- Advocating for, or encouraging, any of the above behavior. Repeated harassment of others. In general, if someone asks you to stop, then stop.
Disagreements, both social and technical, happen all the time and this community is no exception. It is important that we resolve disagreements and differing views constructively. Being unable to understand why someone holds a viewpoint doesn’t mean that they’re wrong and insteadd focus on helping to resolve issues to advance the common goals (like fixing an issues to help users) and learning from mistakes.
Nobody is expected to be perfect in this community. Asking questions early avoids many problems later, so questions are encouraged, though they may be directed to the appropriate forum. Those who are asked should be responsive and helpful.
When somebody leaves or disengages from the project, we ask that they do so in a way that minimises disruption to the project. They should tell people they are leaving and take the proper steps to ensure that others can pick up where they left off.
Modified from the Django Code of Conduct, Sugarlabs and the Speak Up! project and on the Ubuntu Code of Conduct. It is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 license. You may re-use it for your own project, and modify it as you wish, just please allow others to use your modifications and give credit to the different sources here (and take a look at them for inspiration)!
If you believe someone is violating the code of conduct we ask that you report it to the Vermont Research Open Source Program Officeat kendall.fortney@verso.edu . All reports will be kept confidential. In some cases we may determine that a public statement will need to be made. If that's the case, the identities of all victims and reporters will remain confidential unless those individuals instruct us otherwise.
If you believe anyone is in physical danger, please notify appropriate law enforcement first. If you are unsure what law enforcement agency is appropriate, please include this in your report and we will attempt to notify them.
If you are unsure whether the incident is a violation, or whether the space where it happened is covered by this Code of Conduct, we encourage you to still report it. We would much rather have a few extra reports where we decide to take no action, rather than miss a report of an actual violation. We do not look negatively on you if we find the incident is not a violation. And knowing about incidents that are not violations, or happen outside our spaces, can also help us to improve the Code of Conduct or the processes surrounding it.
In your report please include:
- Your contact info (so we can get in touch with you if we need to follow up)
- Names (real, nicknames, or pseudonyms) of any individuals involved. If there were other witnesses besides you, please try to include them as well.
- When and where the incident occurred. Please be as specific as possible.
- Your account of what occurred. If there is a publicly available record (e.g. a mailing list archive or a public IRC logger) please include a link.
- Any extra context you believe existed for the incident.
- If you believe this incident is ongoing.
- Any other information you believe we should have.
- What happens after you file a report? You will receive an email from VERSO Program Director acknowledging receipt immediately. We promise to acknowledge receipt within 24 hours (and will aim for much quicker than that).
The working group will immediately meet to review the incident and determine:
- What happened.
- Whether this event constitutes a code of conduct violation.
- Who the bad actor was.
- Whether this is an ongoing situation, or if there is a threat to anyone's physical safety. If this is determined to be an ongoing incident or a threat to physical safety, the working groups' immediate priority will be to protect everyone involved. This means we may delay an "official" response until we believe that the situation has ended and that everyone is physically safe.
Once the working group has a complete account of the events they will make a decision as to how to response. Responses may include:
- Nothing (if we determine no violation occurred).
- A private reprimand from the working group to the individual(s) involved.
- A public reprimand.
- A permanent or temporary ban from some or all spaces (mailing lists, IRC, etc.)
- A request for a public or private apology. We'll respond within one week to the person who filed the report with either a resolution or an explanation of why the situation is not yet resolved.
Once we've determined our final action, we'll contact the original reporter to let them know what action (if any) we'll be taking. We'll take into account feedback from the reporter on the appropriateness of our response, but we don't guarantee we'll act on it.
Finally, VERSO may choose to a public report of the incident.