About this guide
The CSCCE encourages contributions from scientific community managers, alumni of our Community Engagement Fellows Program (CEFP), and members of our Community of Practice. This document sets out the types of contributions we accept and the standards we expect those contributions to meet.
CSCCE is not a publisher and our editorial process is light. We expect contributors to adhere to these guidelines in good faith.
We reserve the right to refuse publication of materials under the CSCCE masthead for any reason.
Types of contributions we accept
Blog posts
The CSCCE blog accepts guest posts on topics related to scientific collaboration and community management. Blog posts are typically 500-1000 words, include links to additional resources, and may contain images (if you have the right to share them). Guest blog posts include the author name at the top and a short bio at the end, which you should include in your submission. Guest blog posts are not posted immediately, as we try to build thematic series of posts, and are lightly edited by our communications director for general grammar and to conform to CSCCE style (see our Blogs Style Guide here). For examples of recent contributions, visit the CSCCE blog here.
One pagers/tip sheets
Typically produced by CEFP Project Teams or CSCCE Working Groups, these short documents (1-3 pages) are released as PDFs in CSCCE’s Zenodo repository and linked to from the appropriate page of the CSCCE website. The documents are formatted into CSCCE templates by our team (see our One Pager Style Guide here), and we will provide a permanent digital object identifier (doi) upon sign off of content. Please note that once a document is uploaded to Zenodo with a doi it cannot be changed. For an example of previously-produced one pagers/tip sheets, please visit the DEI resource page here.
Guidebooks
Much like one-pagers, guidebooks are typically community-created documents, but they are much longer and require organization into a guidebook. Guidebooks contain “how to” information about a given topic and often collate a wide array of additional resources. Again, the CSCCE team will format your guidebook once complete (see our Report or Guidebook Style Guide here) and provide a final version for sign off before uploading to Zenodo and providing a doi. Please note that once a document is uploaded to Zenodo with a doi it cannot be changed. For an example of previously-produced guidebook, please take a look at Building community at scientific events (2020) Bertipaglia, Meyer, Bakker, Hsu, Guzy, and Carter doi:10.5281/zenodo.3838154.
Reports
Similar to a guidebook, reports are large documents that require multiple chapters or sections. Their distinguishing feature is the need to publish original data. Again, the CSCCE team will format your report once complete (see our Report or Guidebook Style Guide here) and provide a final version for sign off before uploading to Zenodo and providing a doi. Please note that once a document is uploaded to Zenodo with a doi it cannot be changed.
White papers
White papers share opinions, hypothese, or other philosophical investigations and offer recommendations to stakeholders. They may or may not present original data. Again, the CSCCE team will format your white paper once complete (see our Report or Guidebook Style Guide here; we will use the Report/Guidebook template for white papers unless there is a compelling reason otherwise) and provide a final version for sign off before uploading to Zenodo and providing a doi. Please note that once a document is uploaded to Zenodo with a doi it cannot be changed.
Community call contributions
CSCCE hosts monthly community calls, which often feature contributions from community members. These calls result in a variety of materials available either publicly or restricted to the CSCCE community of practice in some way. Community calls in their entirety are recorded and made available upon request to community members via Dropbox. We are currently working to make the presentation portions of these calls (i.e., not the open discussion or breakout rooms) available publicly via YouTube. Community call virtual notes are curated in Google Drive and available to anyone with the link.
We create a blog post to advertise the call, as well as a recap blog post on the CSCCE website, where we also host additional resources. Presenters are encouraged to use the CSCCE slide template for Powerpoint or Keynote, and are welcome to share their slides as a linked resource if they so choose. We expect all contributions to community calls to meet the expectations laid out below for all CSCCE-produced content.
Publication expectations
When submitting any of the above documents to CSCCE, every author must agree that the following terms are met:
- Written words, unless indicated as a quote, are original and created by the author(s).
- All quotes are credited appropriately.
- Images are reproduced with the permission of the creator and credited as such (unless available in the public domain).
- All relevant references are included either as links in blog posts or in a dedicated reference section and indicated in the text by number (see “Crediting the work of others” below).
- You have sought permission from your organization to publish the item, if required.
Crediting the work of others
Blog posts should contain hyperlinked text to references or resources as appropriate. For example, if you are talking about an idea set forth previously elsewhere, include a link to the original source.
Ideas originating from the CSCCE Community of Practice should be cited as such. If naming someone, please contact them ahead of time to ensure that they are happy to be identified and offer to include some form of contact information (e.g., twitter handle, website).
References in PDF documents should be cited in the text by number, and collated at the end of the document in the order in which they are mentioned. Our reference style for journal articles is:
Corpas M, Gehlenborg N, Janga SC, Bourne PE (2008) Ten simple rules for organizing a scientific meeting. PLoS Comput Biol doi: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1000080
Our reference style for web articles/blog posts is:
Woodley L (2014) All together now: Event formats for networking. Social in silico
For citations that don’t fit these formats, please include a hyperlink and we will decide on the appropriate formatting.
Copyright and distribution
All blog posts are published on our website under CSCCE copyright. We welcome you linking to them or referencing them. If you’d like to reproduce them, please email info@cscce.org for permissions. We are usually very happy for you to cross post a post that you have authored on your own organization’s blog, for example.
One pagers, guidebooks, and white papers are either published open access, under one of the Creative Commons licenses, or CSCCE retains full copyright. We will make this decision in collaboration with you.
The CSCCE logo is a trademark of the Center for Scientific Collaboration and Community Engagement and should not be reused elsewhere except with permission.