Across the computer systems and architecture community there has been A Call to Action to advance and promote diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) values through systemic change. Towards this step, HPCA 2021, PPoPP 2021, CGO 2021, and CC 2021 held a joint session panel on “Valuing Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Our Computing Community” to discuss paths across academia and industry. Recent Computer Architecture Today posts have raised awareness and advocated for greater DEI efforts including: Gender Diversity in Computer Architecture, Statement on Diversity at MICRO-50, What Happens to Us Does Not Happen to Most of You, Inclusion and Conference Governance, and Chilly Climate in Computer Architecture?. Building an inclusive and safe research community requires collective and continued efforts from all members.
This summer, the Computer Architecture Student Association (CASA) is organizing the “Advancing and Promoting DEI in Computer Architecture Summer Reading Group”. The goals for the reading group are (1) provide a venue for computer architecture researchers and practitioners to study and discuss challenges and paths for broadening participation in computer architecture, (2) encourage a data-driven approach to understanding DEI in computer architecture by reading and analyzing scholarly work, (3), create a diverse community where everyone has the opportunity to share their experiences and perspectives, and (4) when possible, invite guest speakers to shed light on their work related to DEI in STEM and computing.
Who can join? The summer reading group is open to all: students, post-docs, faculty, and industry practitioners. In addition to computer architecture, we welcome anyone in computer systems and computing more generally.
When is the reading group? The summer reading group will be held over six-to-seven sessions this summer 2021. To enable attendance across different schedules and time zones, the reading group sessions will be held at different times of the week throughout the summer. Sessions will be hosted roughly every two to three weeks. We have provided the tentative schedule below.
How is each session structured? Each session will be around 1 hour long. Central to this reading group is enabling anyone interested in joining the reading group to have the opportunity to do so. As such, each session will be split into two components, and no pre-meeting readings or literature sourcing is required. During the first 20 minutes of the session we will read the paper, book chapter, or article together (following copyright and fair use guidelines). In the latter 40 minutes of the session the members will discuss the presented material in groups of no more than 25. Breakout rooms will be used if the attendance is larger than 25.
We hope splitting the session into two distinct components will encourage individuals that may not otherwise be able to read the material beforehand to participate as well. Individuals that have already read the material on their own may join the second half directly. CASA members and volunteers will facilitate discussions for each session. We will be hosting both daytime and nighttime sessions for each reading to allow participation from the whole community around the world.
Tentative Schedule:
How to participate? There are many ways to participate in the summer reading group. First, everyone is more than welcome to join each announced session via the registration links above.
Sign up for notifications and information via this Google Forms registration link. We hope to encourage discussions across a diverse range of experiences in computing. Finally, if you would like to volunteer to help guide discussions during the sessions please also reach out to CASA. We are looking forward to working with the community on organizing this summer reading group!
Hope to see you at the first summer reading group on June 10th!
About the Authors: The Computer Architecture Student Association (CASA) is an independent student-run organization with the express purpose of developing and fostering a positive and inviting student community within computer architecture.
Disclaimer: These posts are written by individual contributors to share their thoughts on the Computer Architecture Today blog for the benefit of the community. Any views or opinions represented in this blog are personal, belong solely to the blog author and do not represent those of ACM SIGARCH or its parent organization, ACM.
