At its heart, computer science is both collaborative and interdisciplinary. Our most creative ideas and breakthroughs happen when we work with and learn from people with different backgrounds, educations and life experiences. But in reality, our dialogue and work often overlooks or excludes many voices with expertise to share. To begin to rectify this, we’re launching a lecture series in spring 2021 that will highlight speakers whose work centers on diversity, equity and inclusion.

We’ll make a full announcement about the program soon, but wanted to begin soliciting nominations for presenters as soon as possible so we can curate a robust, informative series that reflects the needs and interests of our community. Please feel free to interpret this call broadly. We’re looking not only for a diversity of ideas, but also a collection of speakers whose own identities vary and reflect the society we live in. Ideas for topics might be bias in research design, the impact of stereotypes in journal review or culturally sustaining pedagogy — though this is certainly far from an exhaustive list.

If you care deeply about this topic and would like to be a part of bringing this series to life, please indicate your willingness to volunteer at the bottom of this form.