The course covers topics such as improving team culture and interpersonal communication; establishing mutually acceptable norms and standards for fieldwork, including codes of conduct and field safety protocols; and crafting emergency response plans for field expeditions. Fieldwork refers to any situation in which researchers will be collecting data, information or samples off-campus or off-site. 

Blair Schneider, associate researcher and science outreach manager at the Kansas Geological Survey, served as co-principal investigator on the project. She will help facilitate debriefing sessions in January for those who have completed the course. 

“I think the most important aspect of the course is that people do it together as a team,” Schneider said. “Coming together as a team and working through those debrief sessions is going to really cement what they learned and we hope build team trust and community collaboration going forward.” 

“KU launched a Safe & Inclusive Fieldwork web portal earlier this year to help researchers ensure safe and inclusive environments for their teams and meet expanding funding agency requirements,” said Mindie Paget, assistant vice chancellor for impact & belonging in the KU Office of Research. “We are excited to add the ADVANCEing FieldSafety course to the menu of training and education opportunities on the site, which supports our commitment to fostering safe and inclusive environments anywhere KU research is conducted.”

ADVANCEing FieldSafety is offered through the University of Colorado-Boulder but is available online, allowing anyone to take the course any time. After completing the course, researchers should be able to identify unsafe and harmful behaviors, respond appropriately to mitigate these behaviors, support those affected by the behaviors and proactively plan to reduce the likelihood of such behaviors in the future.

“I am hoping this is something that we can encourage not just within the KGS but to anyone participating in a field team at KU,” Schneider said. 

The curriculum is part of the ADVANCEing FieldSafety program, a collaboration between FieldSafe, a workshop led by UC-Boulder’s Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences aimed at building safe and inclusive field teams, and ADVANCEGeo, a National Science Foundation-funded partnership that addresses harassment and exclusionary behaviors in the geosciences. 

Access the free ADVANCEing FieldSafety course online.

Providing support for campus researchers is a priority of KU Endowment’s current campus fundraising campaign. For information on how you can help support KU Research, please contact Michael Arp, Assistant Vice President of Development at KU endowment, at 785-832-7410.