about.qmd

---
title: "About"
description: Background and structure of the R Foundation taskforce on women and other under-represented groups
---

## Background

The task force was set up by the [R Foundation](https://www.r-project.org/foundation/) in December 2015 to address the underrepresentation of women and rebranded in January 2017 to accommodate more under-represented groups such as LGBT, minority ethnic groups, and people with disabilities in the R community.

The members of the task force were invited to participate based on their interest in routing for specific under-represented groups and their contributions in the area of diversity and inclusion, to reflect different genders, ethnic groups, work contexts, career stages and aspects of the R project (e.g. CRAN and Bioconductor). The task force focuses on particular tasks as outlined below:

- **Accessibility**: Working to improve access to R materials for people with low vision, blindness, hard of hearing, deaf, and other disabilities.

- **Community**: General outreach to help people from under-represented groups get into R and develop as useRs.

- **Conferences**: Focusing on R Foundation conferences, liaising with organizers/program committee on policies and inclusion initiatives.

- **On-ramps**: Creating paths for useRs to develop their skills and make contributions to the R/BioConductor package ecosystem.

- **Social Media**: Posting to Twitter and/or Facebook, soliciting blog posts and publishing them, maintaining website.

- **Surveys**: Running and analysing community surveys, packaging up data and tools and maintaining the [Data](https://forwards.github.io/data/) page.

- **Teaching**: Methodology, materials and workshops designed for under-represented groups.


The activities of the taskforce are recorded in the [minutes of our bimonthly core team teleconferences and alternate monthly all team slackathons](https://github.com/forwards/meetings-public). We are open to new members joining one of our sub-teams. If interested, please contact rowforwards@gmail.com.

The task force is happy to engage with other individuals and organisations (such as [R-Ladies](http://r-ladies.org/)) that are concerned about diversity and inclusion and actively seek outside collaboration on specific tasks.


## Team Members

[Heather Turner](https://warwick.ac.uk/statistics/staff/academic-research/turner) - ([LinkedIn](https://uk.linkedin.com/in/heathrturnr)/[Mastodon](https://fosstodon.org/@HeathrTurnr)/ [GitHub](https://github.com/hturner))

[gwynn gebeyehu](http://www.nzgwynn.com/) - ([Mastodon](https://mstdn.social/@nzgwynn))/[GitHub](https://github.com/nzgwynn))

[Jonathan Godfrey](https://r-resources.massey.ac.nz/BrailleR) - (Massey University, NZ). ([Twitter](https://twitter.com/ajrgodfrey)/[GitHub](https://github.com/ajrgodfrey))

Kevin O’Brien - ([LinkedIn](https://ie.linkedin.com/in/kobriendublin)/[Twitter](https://twitter.com/DragonflyStats)/[GitHub](https://github.com/DragonflyStats))

[Ella Kaye](https://ellakaye.rbind.io) - ([LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/ella-kaye-9b878248/)/[Mastodon](https://fosstodon.org/@ellakaye)/[GitHub](https://github.com/EllaKaye))

[Noa Tamir](https://forwards.github.io/about/noatamir.com) - ([LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/noatamir)/[Twitter](https://twitter.com/noatamir)/[GitHub](https://github.com/noatamir))

Saranjeet Kaur Bhogal -  ([LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/saranjeet-kaur-48ab769b/)/[Twitter](https://twitter.com/qwertyquesting/)/[GitHub](https://github.com/SaranjeetKaur))

[Emma Rand](https://www.york.ac.uk/biology/our-staff/emma-rand/) - ([LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/emma-rand-6b0a61a/)/[Twitter](https://twitter.com/er13_r)/[GitHub](https://github.com/3mmaRand))

Zane Dax -  ([Twitter](https://twitter.com/startrek_lt/)/[GitHub](https://github.com/PythonCoderUnicorn))

[Liz Hare](http://www.doggenetics.com) - ([LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/liz-hare-1a50925/)/[Mastodon](https://mstdn.social/@lizhare@fosstodon.org)/[GitHub](https://github.com/LizHareDogs))

[Julie Josse](http://juliejosse.com/) -  ([LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/julie-josse-4886a2140/)/[Twitter](https://twitter.com/JulieJosseStat)/[GitHub](https://github.com/julierennes))

Michael Chirico -  ([Twitter](https://twitter.com/michael_chirico)/[GitHub](https://github.com/MichaelChirico))

Daniela Cialfi - ([LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/daniela-cialfi/?originalSubdomain=it)

Michael Lawrence - ([LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-lawrence-74a9b482/)/[Twitter](https://twitter.com/lawremi)/[GitHub](https://github.com/lawremi))


[Paola Corrales](https://paocorrales.github.io/) - ([Twitter](https://twitter.com/paobcorrales?lang=en)/[GitHub](https://github.com/paocorrales))

[Di Cook](http://dicook.org) - ([LinkedIn](https://au.linkedin.com/in/dianne-cook-a4877a104)/[Twitter](https://twitter.com/visnut)/[GitHub](https://github.com/dicook))


[Isabella Gollini](https://sites.google.com/site/isabellagollini/) - ([LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/isabellagollini/)/[Twitter](https://twitter.com/IsabellaGollini)/[GitHub](https://github.com/igollini))


[Mine Çetinkaya-Rundel](http://mine-cr.com/) - ([LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/minec/)/[Twitter](https://twitter.com/minebocek)/[GitHub](https://github.com/mine-cetinkaya-rundel))


Maria Prokofieva - ([LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/mariapr/)/[Twitter](https://twitter.com/m45hap)/[GitHub](https://github.com/maria-pro))

[Joyce Robbins](http://www.joyce-robbins.com/about/) - ([LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/joycerobbins/)/[Twitter](https://twitter.com/jtrnyc)/[GitHub](https://github.com/jtr13))


## Previous Members

Claudia Huaylla  
Andrea Sánchez-Tapia  
Samantha Toet   
Yanina Bellini Saibene   
Jyoti Bhogal   
Ritwik Mitra  
Emily Dodwell   
Allison Vuong    
Becca Wilson   
Anna Vasylytsya    
Nujcharee Haswell   
Pavitra Chakravarty    
Maya Gans   
Miljenka Vuko    
Imke Mayer   
Florencia Mangini    
Joslynn Lee   
Damiano Cerasuolo   
Tania Allard   
Tatjana Kecojevic   
Richard Ngamita 

Lorna Maria Aine

Stella Bollman    
Jenny Bryan    
Nic Crane  
Rudolf Debelak  
John Fox  
Jasmine Dumas  
Andrea Foulkes  
Gina Griffin  
Madlene Hamilton  
Zhian N. Kamvar  
Liz Kellogg  
Os Keyes  
Angela Li  
Gina Merchant  
David Meza  
Ileena Mitra  
Jesse Mostipak  
Shakirah Nakalungi  
Wenfeng Qin  
Augustina Ragwitz  
Maëlle Salmon  
Dorris Scott  
Tracy Shen  
David Smith  
Carolin Strobl  
Charlotte Wickham  
Hadley Wickham  
Yizhe Xu