Samvera Community Helpers

Renewal of Helpers and Review of Documentation

• In late summer (Q3) each year all current helpers with terms expiring before the following summer will be asked if they wish to continue serving for another two-year term (aligned with the next two calendar years to make management easier).

• At the beginning of each year (Q1), helpers will be asked to:

  • Review the Code of Conduct Samvera Code of Conduct and Anti-Harassment Policy and Samvera Helpers page Samvera Community Helpers to refresh their understanding and check for anything that might need review

  • Review the Community Guidelines and check for anything that might need review

  • Identify and nominate new Helpers

Role of the Helpers

In the interest of adequate coverage and context, the group of Helpers should have an appropriate mix of members based on their level of regular presence and participation in Samvera spaces, such as:

• Developers actively contributing to Samvera products, participating routinely on tech calls, community sprints, pull request reviews, component maintenance

• Designers, service/product managers, and analysts who are involved in sprints, reporting bugs, or Interest Groups and Working Groups activities

• Board members

With the introduction of a dedicated Response Team in 2021, the role of the Helpers has been scoped more narrowly. The Helpers will:

• Monitor the Helpers email list

• Refer any reports of Code of Conduct violations to the Response Team, but no longer are be responsible for incident response 

• Participate in reviewing the Code of Conduct and Anti-Harassment policy annually for revisions

• Support new Helpers

  • Identify and nominate new Helpers

  • Maintain onboarding documentation and resources

• Commit to serving a term of two years

• Be eligible to volunteer or be nominated for the role of Incident Responder

Helping at Samvera Events

Event Helpers are a group of volunteers who are committed to providing help to others within the Samvera Community at various Samvera events. Helpers assist in fielding concerns regarding reported violations of the Code of Conduct and Anti-Harassment Policy, or responding to general help requests. Event Helpers can be members of the Samvera Community Helpers or volunteers from the Community.  Event helpers serve a variety of roles:

• Presenting and explaining the Code of Conduct and Anti-Harassment Policy at the beginning of each day of Samvera events

• Staffing welcome table at Samvera Connect meetings

• Being available for questions

• Mentoring new Samverans

• Coordinating with event organizers (program committee, local hosts) as needed

Becoming a Helper

Samvera Community Helper and Response Team Volunteer Form

The Helpers have been and integral part of building the Samvera Community. Examples of past Helper activities include:

• Drafted and periodically updated the original Anti-Harassment Policy and Samvera Code of Conduct and Anti-Harassment Policy

• Volunteered to be formally available at specific events as on-call Helpers

• Responded to reports of disrespectful behavior or Code of Conduct violations

• Engaged in discussions with community members about practices and expectations of event presenters (eg., pronouns, verbally describing one’s appearance)

• Monitored the Helpers email list