I've recievced many calls and emails from colleagues asking for advice on what to do. Twitter isn't optimal, but I have grants and papers to get done, so this will have to do. In anticipation of this planning meeting... some concrete agenda items. 1/n https://www.shutdownstem.com/ 

1) Be a good human. This is the foundation for everything.
2) Treat your black colleagues as ... colleagues. Invite them to join your reviews and grant applications. Symposia. Start a collaboration.

2a) My own list includes @kaymtye @KarlDeisseroth @denisejcai @miketadross @EricJNestler @RCBagot @CircadianClocks @McClungColleen @NIMHDirector @ruimcosta ...and others! Grants/promotion much easier with names like these on your CV. . We r overdue @superkash. My bad.

2a.1) These scholars gave me boots.. used these boots to pull myself up..all the way up (insert Fat Joe/Remy Ma here)
3) Take active steps to cite your colleagues' papers. Believe it or not, it matters in academic settings.
4) Read your colleagues' papers (related to 3b).

5) Lead journal clubs about your colleagues papers (related to 4)
5.1) Feel free to scrutinize these papers just as you would any other paper (related to 3 and 4). Its what we were trained to do.

6) Do your homework, diversity efforts didn't start in 2020.
6.1) Read Ginther et. al 2011. Scientists believe data... shouldn't expect any less regarding this issue.
6.2) Workforce Diversity Report (NIH 2012)
6.3) National Academy, Breaking Through Report (2018).

Action steps. 7) Call your Senator's office every day between now and Nov 1st. Doesn't take long. Tell them about importance of scientific research -particularly the importance of diversity (related to 6).

7a) tell them expanded funding will be necessary. People in TN will be particularly impactful ->HELP committee.
8) Email/call @NIMHDirector @NINDSdirector and @BrainInitiativ and express your support for K99/R00 diversity program. Email your senator to express support as well.

9) For non-neuro faculty, email your institute director and senator and petition them to develop parallel programs.
10) For neuro faculty, email @NINDSdirector and express your support for D-SPAN program.

11)Recruit a D-SPAN scholar to your lab for postdoc (related to 10). Build a collaboration with their current mentor now. This will help future recruitment, and their current mentors program. It will expand your science too (but these actions aren't necessarily about you).

12) Write and thank @HHMINEWS for their investments in the Gilliam and Hanna Gray fellowships. Recruit these scholars.

12a) We are a capitalistic society so keep in mind the economic forces of supply and demand $$$. Economic forces dominate most parts of academia, so this is not the area to selectively promote socialism.

13) Totally biased -but educate yourself about the Meyerhoff program. Mentor a scholar. Recruit a scholar. Hire a scholar. See CBS 60Mins 2011, or ask any administrator in higher ed.

14) To the geneticists, please work to make sure your GWAS studies extrapolate to black people. If you do basic work (like me)... be aware genes in GWAS studies don't always extrapolate to everyone. You may be discovering mechanisms that yield drugs that only work for some!

15) Call your senator and congress person to thank them for their investments in the precision medicine initiative @AllofUsResearch . Directly related to 14.

16) Invite your black colleagues to give department talks. @DaniSBassett reached out to me in Feburary to express the importance of generating a speaker list of black faculty, so please send her names!

17) Use knowledge gained from other diversity efforts to advance your efforts in this area (see 16). Find partners to advance these efforts. Thanks again @DaniSBassett

18) Acknowledge that grit and resilience are important factors in scientific success.
18b) Identify (or invent) ways to quantify these traits -Plenty of colleagues in psych depts can help.
18c) Include these objective metrics in department's graduate student selction process

19) Please be a good human. None of this works if you want to be a bad one.

It should go without saying, but VOTE!

Feel free to contact me once you've completed this list. I'm a scientist. Don't have time to provide more things to do until you're fine with first list.

Ignore typos. I'm old and my fingers hurt. Eyes too. Never writing a tweet this long again. Now, gotta get back to trying to cure depression.