Jornada Basin LTER Code of Ethics

The Jornada Basin LTER strives to uphold high ethical standards and create a diverse, equitable, and inclusive scientific community for its researchers, students, staff, and collaborators. At the individual level this also commits that persons associated with the Jornada Basin LTER must abide by the policies of the institutions that employ them and follow the ethical standards of the research organizations and professional societies to which they belong. To give a few examples:

  1. Employees of New Mexico State University (NMSU) must follow NMSU policy during all work-related activities.
  2. Professional ecologists at Jornada should follow the ESA Code of Ethics if they are members.
  3. All Jornada personnel attending LTER-sponsored meetings must follow the LTER Network Meeting Code of Conduct.

The Jornada Basin LTER is a coalition of many people and institutions, so other policies and standards also apply. The examples above, however, are generally representative of policies and standards in our academic and scientific community, and thus inform the core values that the Jornada Basin LTER adheres to. Those values are summarized below.

The JRN Code of Conduct

The Jornada Basin LTER, its participants, and our collaborators are expected to:

  • Abide by principles of academic integrity and ethical professional conduct.
  • Encourage a culture of respect, safety, and cooperation among all researchers, staff, and students.
  • Refrain from discrimination, intimidation, or harassment of any kind.
  • Be proactive advocates for, and supporters of, diversity, equity, and inclusion in science.

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Policy

The Jornada Basin LTER is hosted by an Equal Opportunity Educational Institution/Equal Opportunity Employer (NMSU) and strongly values diversity and equity among our investigators, postdocs, students, technicians, and collaborators. Beyond diversity, the Jornada Basin LTER is convinced of the moral and academic value of justice, equity, and inclusion. We are therefore committed to providing an inclusive and safe work and learning environment for persons of any age, ancestry, color, disability, gender identity, genetic information, national origin, race, religion, serious medical condition, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, spousal affiliation or protected veteran status. Beyond passively supporting these ideals, we have adopted a proactive stance towards achieving diverse and equitable outcomes by:

  • assessing our program’s diversity and inclusion and reporting progress on an annual basis
  • allocating resources to meet desired diversity, equity, and inclusion outcomes
  • using outreach, mentoring, paid fellowships, and other initiatives to support the participation of under-represented and disadvantaged groups in science
  • creating open opportunities for training and discussion on subjects impacting the diversity, equity, and inclusion of the Jornada Basin LTER
  • recruiting scientists, staff, and students from diverse backgrounds to work at and collaborate with the Jornada Basin LTER

Reporting Violations

If you are the target of, or a witness to, any incident of discrimination, harassment, intimidation, or other forms of misconduct while participating in Jornada Basin LTER activities, it is mandatory to report it. You should report these incidents to your team leader, project PI, or the Jornada Basin LTER Lead-PI or Co-PIs. You should also report incidents to the appropriate institutional authority, law enforcement, or campus resource. Some guidelines and resources are below.

Reporting Title IX, Discrimination, and Harassment

For Title IX violations, and all discrimination, harassment, and related incidents, which are described by NMSU policy, it is required that the incident be immediately reported to the institutional Title IX and/or Equal Opportunity/Equity office that represents the individuals directly involved in the incident. If involved individuals come from more than one institution, then the incident should be reported to the Title IX office for each institution involved. The two most prominent institutions participating in the Jornada Basin LTER are NMSU and the USDA-ARS Jornada Experimental Range. Resources for reporting Equal Opportunity and Title IX incidents at these institutions are below.

Conduct and DEI Resources at JRN & LTER Network

The Jornada Safety Handbook and Code of Conduct

The programs and facilities of the Jornada, including JRN LTER and the Jornada LTAR site, are committed to ensuring a safe, inclusive, and productive work environment for all participants that come to do research there. We maintain a Safety Handbook and Code of Conduct document that is regularly updated with input from our community. If you will be visiting the Jornada, or any of our affiliated facilities, please read the document and follow all relevant guidelines.

Some important sections of the handbook are:

You can download the full handbook as a PDF file.