The 2020 ISB election is underway from Sept 28 – Oct 02, 2020.
To view the list of candidates, click here.
Biocuration 2020 online workshops
As part of the Biocuration 2020 conference we had received excellent workshop proposals from several groups. Since the cancellation of the meeting we have been working with interested workshop organizers to bring this part of the conference online. We are excited to announce that we now have 3 workshops scheduled for the fall:
- September 24, 9am PT, 12pm ET, 5pm CET – Biocompute Objects: Methods for communicating provenance of data and analysis
- October 29, 12pm PT, 3pm ET, 8pm CET – Gene Wiki: how to synchronize and curate primary sources with and in Wikidata
- Dec 04, 8am PT, 11am ET, 4pm UK, 5pm CET – Biolink Model – A community driven data model for life sciences
All workshops will be free to all participants.
There is a Slack workspace set up to facilitate communication between organizers and participants. If you are interested in attending any of these workshops please email biocuration2020 @ gmail.com and we will send you an invite to the Slack workspace.
EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE ELECTION 2020
The election of the new International Society for Biocuration Executive Committee (ISB EC) will be held from September 27 – October 04, 2020.
The list of 7 candidates for 2020 can be viewed here.
The Executive Committee is composed of nine (9) members, each with a 3-year term. Being a member of the Executive Committee is a great way to become directly involved with the work of our society, and contribute to the decisions that are taken on behalf of the biocuration community. We would like to encourage all members interested in running for election to get involved in the process.
Serving on the ISB EC minimally involves attending monthly (1 hour) teleconference meetings, following up on any action items from meetings, and promoting the ISB’s activity to members and non-members. Examples of activities performed by EC members include reviewing micro-grant submissions, preparing call for participation for hosting Biocuration meetings, preparing materials for the ISB election, monitoring ISB mail and maintaining the website. There are specific positions such as Chair, Secretary and Treasurer that will require a larger time commitment, as they will be in charge of leading the steps of the EC and by extension the membership.
3 positions on the Executive Committee are up for election in 2020/2021. These positions are currently held by Nicole Vasilevsky, Rama Balakrishnan and Sylvain Poux. Nicole and Rama can re-stand for election. (The current ISB EC members are here.)
2020 Electoral Process
A) The Nominating Committee:
A Nominating Committee (NC) has been formed to oversee the electoral process, to review applications, and establish the final list of candidates. We are very grateful for their assistance with the execution of this election. The members of the 2020 Nominating Committee are TBD.
B) Instructions to Candidates:
- If you would like to run for a position on the Executive Committee, you must first register your intent with the NC by emailing intsocbio@simplelists.com
- Please fill out this form by 28 August 2020, which includes a ‘statement of intent‘, a brief biographical sketch, and a ‘conflict of interests‘ statement describing any activities, memberships of other associations, editorial positions on journals, etc. (Please email us at intsocbio@simplelists.com if you are unable to access this form.)
C) Timeline:
- Nominations will be received until 28 August 2020.
- The NC will review all candidacies and share their selections with the ISB Executive Committee by 14 September 2020.
- Candidates must be announced to the membership and on website (with letters of intent) by 21 September 2020.
- Voting will take place online over the course of one week from 27 September – 04 October 2020. (Further details about the voting process will be shared soon). Sue Bello will act as election officer.
- Only paying members* with registration fees cleared on or before 21 September 2020 will be allowed to vote. If you pay your registration via bank transfer, please allow at least 2-3 working days for the payment to be processed.
*Note – please contact us at intsocbio@simplelists.com if you have issues with registering or renewing your membership. Known issues exist with our membership payment system.
The Nominating Committee is looking forward to receiving your applications!
ISB statement from the Equity, Inclusion and Diversity committee
In response to recent events related to racism and injustice, most recently in the United States, but still present everywhere in the world, and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. The ISB is a society devoted to fostering diversity, equity, and inclusion in the scientific enterprise and in society as a whole. We unequivocally sustain and believe that Black Lives Matter.
Like all STEM organisations, we cannot ignore both the legacy of racism, especially in the life sciences, and the reality of discrimination in our institutions and workplaces. In the specific case of our membership, we are aware that discrimination is present in our field, and it is often reflected in a lack of recognition, defined career-tracks, or opportunties for advancement for people invested in biocuration.
What can we do? The ISB EDI committee was created in response to a necessary discussion about sexism, and we were aware from the start of the necessity of tackling other forms of discrimination and intersectionality. We must accelerate our current efforts, and go beyond them.
Current efforts:
- Our code of ethics and professional conduct directly addresses our commitment to inclusion and recognition of all community members and the expected behavior of ISB members (https://www.biocuration.org/isb-code-of-ethics-and-professional-conduct/)
- We have included an optional question on ethnicity in our membership and conference registration forms so we can assess the diversity of our community, and inform plans for how to attract and retain members from underrepresented groups
- We make available several funding opportunities for our members, the awarding of which aims to be free of bias, including:
- The Biocuration Inclusivity Award provides individual ISB members with funding towards attending biocuration-relevant events (https://www.biocuration.org/the-biocuration-inclusivity-award/)
- Microgrants – we offer funding to support regional meetings, encouraging those that relate to diversity and inclusion (https://www.biocuration.org/community/microgrants/)
- Fellowships – the short-term fellowship fosters mutually beneficial collaborations across groups, encouraging participation from diverse geographical locations (https://www.biocuration.org/community/fellowships/)
- Scholarships are now available for the Postgraduate Certificate in Biocuration run by the Institute of Continuing Education (ICE) at the University of Cambridge (https://www.biocuration.org/isb-scholarship-postgraduate-certificate-in-biocuration/).
- Travel fellowships are available to support travel to the annual Biocuration Conference
New initiatives:
- We are currently working on inviting champions of equity, diversity, and inclusion from a variety of institutions to present webinars on the subject of EDI; to share with us more on how the subject is addressed at their institutions and to advise ISB members on what we can do to make a difference
- We will continue to review and revise, where necessary, our Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct to ensure that we represent the values and beliefs of all of our community
We welcome you to get in touch with any questions, concerns or suggestions. All members of our community are welcome to participate in the EDI Committee. Please email us at: intsocbio@gmail.com.
Slides and recording available from annual general meeting
Thanks to those who were able to attend the Annual General Meeting on June 30, 2020.
For those who missed it, or want to review the materials, the slides and recording are available on the ISB conference page and below.
Slides – Annual General Meeting 2020 (google slides)
Recording – Annual Genera Meeting 2020 (.mp4 format)
Annual General Meeting June 30, 2020
You are invited to a virtual Annual General Meeting of the International Society for Biocuration on Tuesday, 30 June, 8am PST, 11am EST, 4:00 PM UK, 5pm western Europe.
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/88975996534
This will take the form of a 30 minute presentation on the Society’s activities followed by a Q&A to the EC.
We look forward to seeing you there.
The ISB Executive Committee
Call in information below:
Topic: ISB AGM
Time: Jun 30, 2020 04:00 PM London
Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/88975996534
Meeting ID: 889 7599 6534
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ISB survey results – congrats to our raffle winner Rachael Huntley
Thanks to all who responded to the annual ISB survey, the results of the survey are available here. These results help us identify ways in which the ISB could better serve our community
Congratulations to our raffle winner Rachael Huntley, from SciBite who won a new iPad!
ISB Scholarship: Postgraduate Certificate in Biocuration
We are pleased to announce an exciting new scholarship opportunity! Scholarships are now available for the Postgraduate Certificate in Biocuration run by the Institute of Continuing Education (ICE) at the University of Cambridge. The course runs from September 23, 2020 to April 16, 2021.
The application deadline for the course is June 7, 2020. To apply, go to: https://www.ice.cam.ac.uk/course/postgraduate-certificate-biocuration
Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, postgraduate programs in the academic year 2020-2021 will initially be delivered remotely with face-to-face teaching returning when the situation becomes viable.
The ISB will be awarding one scholarship for this course, to cover 2/3rds of the registration fees. The scholarship application form can be found here.
Eligibility Requirements:
To apply for the scholarship, one must be an active member of the ISB and be accepted into the course. We apologize for the late notice of this scholarship opportunity.
The deadline to apply for the scholarship is July 31st, 2020.
Improving Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI) in Biocuration Webinar
In lieu of hosting a workshop at the Biocuration2020 conference, the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion subcommittee of the International Society for Biocuration will host a 30-minute webinar that will be open to the Biocuration community.
Title: Improving Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI) in Biocuration
When: Monday, 11th May
Time: 8.30-9.00am PT/4.30-5.00pm BST
Where: Zoom (details to be sent before the webinar – please register below)
Host: The EDI subcommittee of the ISB
Speakers: Nicole Vasilevsky (Oregon Health & Science University, Portland, Oregon, USA), Rachael Huntley (SciBite, Cambridge, UK), Moni Munoz-Torres (Oregon State University, Berkeley, CA, USA)
The webinar outline is as follows:
- Introduction to the EDI subcommittee
- Overview of work to date: the ISB conference Code of Conduct, recommendations for conference organizers & analysis of the ISB conference gender distributions over the past 10 years
- Sli.do discussion/brainstorm for what our goals should be for the upcoming year.
Please register here.
We will email you the zoom link and a password the night before the webinar.
The webinar recording is available here.
Midori Harris – RECIPIENT OF THE 2020 BIOCURATION AWARD
It is our great pleasure to announce the recipient of the 2020 Biocuration Award:
Midori Harris from PomBase, University of Cambridge, UK was unanimously selected for the Biocuration Career Award.
Midori started her career in biocuration at Saccharomyces Genome Database as a curator and Gene Ontology (GO) developer. Her colleague, Val Wood, the PomBase project manager, attributes a large part of the success of GO to Midori’s insight, precision and clarity. Midori currently works for PomBase, which now benefits from her skills in both curation best practice, and in the development of the Fission Yeast Phenotype Ontology (FYPO). Midori is currently collaborating with EBI and Monarch Initiative to integrate FYPO into uPheno which will help to provide much needed generic phenotype terms for describing cell level phenotypes. She also now maintains the Fungal Anatomy Ontology FAO. All of these projects have far reaching benefits across many areas of biocuration and biology.
Thank you to the Award committee:
- Tiffany Callahan, Computational Biology PhD Candidate at University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, USA
- Violeta Ilik, Head Digital Collections and Preservation Systems at Columbia University in the City of New York, USA
- Varsha Khodiyar, Data Curation Manager at Springer Nature, UK
- Michael Livstone, Senior Scientific Data Curator at Bristol-Myers Squibb, USA
- Luana Licata, Scientific Database Curator at University of Rome “Tor Vergata”, Italy
- Zhang Zhang, Professor at National Genomics Data Center, China
Congratulations to Midori!
