The UCAR, NSF NCAR, and UCP community is a diverse and vibrant community, composed of individuals with a wide array of backgrounds, identities, and perspectives.

In order to create an inclusive and welcoming environment that maximizes scientific, engineering, business, and education excellence, and employee wellbeing, we must understand and value the myriad voices and perspectives of those in our community, and develop a culture of respect, inclusivity, and belonging that supports all of us in reaching our full potential. Diversity, equity, and inclusion are inseparable from the core mission of our organization: to conduct and support exceptional science, engineering, business practices, and education, with and for society and for the betterment of life on Earth.

As an organization, we believe in radical transparency when it comes to our metrics and accountability mechanisms and we publish many of these publicly on our website for you to see. You can explore our data on the Measuring Our Progress page.

Our 2019-2025 UCAR DEI Strategic Plan has guided all of our institution’s DEI priorities thus far. We aim to update this document in 2026 to reflect the information coming out of the 2025 Workplace Culture survey and the changing environments in which we find ourselves working. These include changes to our physical environments due to COVID and new flexible, hybrid, and remote work options.

Read the NSF NCAR and UCAR Case for Diversity

Organizational Structure

UCAR’s Office of DEI (ODEI) leads the strategic planning and overall direction of the DEI work across UCAR, NSF NCAR, and UCP. NSF NCAR also has a DEI Office, partnering with ODEI to support the needs of the NSF NCAR Labs. NSF NCAR DEI leads the work with Minority Serving Institutions. UCP has a DEI liaison, who works closely with the UCP Programs to support and meet their DEI needs. All three groups collaborate closely to maximize our effectiveness and support for the organization.

While ODEI sets the direction, every UCAR, NSF NCAR and UCP LCPO is involved in the implementation. Several lead DEI initiatives that stretch beyond the immediate reach of ODEI, for example, HR’s Talent and Learning Development Team include multiple DEI topics in supervisor and other trainings.

How We Put This Into Practice

Our organization is committed to four major pillars that all contribute to a diverse, inclusive, and welcoming environment for all. These pillars are based on the work of Dr. Damon Williams from his book Strategic Diversity Leadership (2015), and adapted to our particular environment. The four pillars make up the four goals in our strategic plan:

Goal 1: A diverse workforce at all levels - Recruiting, retaining, promoting, and investing in a diverse and inclusive workforce at all levels. Our goal is to reach gender and racial demographic parity in our STEM workforce with the available talent pool by 2029. That talent pool is derived from the graduating cohorts in the degrees from which we tend to hire. More information about how we calculate these talent pools and our progress toward our goals can be found in Measuring Our Progress.

Goal 2: A welcoming, ethical, and inclusive workplace - Fostering a workplace culture that promotes inclusive excellence and psychological safety for all, where we are all encouraged and valued in bringing our talents, skills, and ideas to our mission, no matter our job title. We track our workplace culture through multiple avenues, including an all-staff Workplace Culture Survey every four years and Pulse Surveys every 6 months. These provide data to help guide our many initiatives and direct resources to where they are needed most.

Goal 3: Ethical partnerships - Partnering with others through culturally responsive practices; working with underrepresented communities in mutually supportive and trusted relationships to enhance and drive co-created scientific research. We partner with professional organizations to support training in DEI for the current and next generation of scientists. We also have long-running relationships with Indigenous partners and communities through NSF NCAR’s Rising Voices Center for Indigenous and Earth Sciences, and collaborations with Minority Serving Institutions to build and foster research partnerships.

Goal 4: Accountability and Metrics - Measuring our impact, committing to transparency, and being accountable to our diverse communities and to society. We measure our progress towards all of our goals through a combination of surveys, professional evaluations, benchmarking against national data, external advisory groups, and informal feedback. This information helps us to make data-driven decisions on how and where to target our resources and efforts to maximize our impact. Our outcomes are publicly available on Measuring Our Progress.

List of Guiding DEI Texts

Below is a list of texts that guide our DEI work throughout the organization:

• DEI Deconstructed: Your No-Nonsense Guide to Doing the Work and Doing It Right, Lily Zheng
• Reconstructing DEI: A Practitioner’s Workbook, Lily Zheng
• Canary Code: A Guide to Neurodiversity, Dignity, and Intersectional Belonging, Ludmilla Praslove 
• Strategic Diversity Leadership: Activating Change & Transformation in Higher Education, Damon Williams 
• Unlocking the Magic of Facilitation: 11 Key Concepts You Didn't Know You Didn't Know, Sam Killerman and Meg Bolger 
• Remote Not Distant: Design a Company Culture That Will Help You Thrive in a Hybrid Workplace, Gustavo Razzetti