Get to Know Our Steering Committee, and Important Changes in The Turing Way Governance
Explore The Turing Way Book and connect with us via our start page.
This newsletter is full of governance updates and other news from the community - read on!
- 📢 Read important updates about our funding and Project Delivery Team status
- 🏛️ Join our upcoming June Community Forum on 19 June
- 🔥 Introducing this year's Fireside Chat series on Community Governance
- 🌱 Meet members of the Steering Committee and Community Management Working Group
- 📚💨 Updates from our May 2025 Book Dash and Collaborations Workshop
As usual, you can find more updates, opportunities and events in the 'Community News' and 'Opportunities in The Turing Way orbit' sections below. To keep up to date with community events, you can also subscribe to our shared calendar here. 📅
If you're interested in keeping up in real-time, don't forget that you can always join our Slack workspace, follow the project on Twitter, LinkedIn or join us on Fosstodon.
Community News and Updates
Illustration by Scriberia showing community as a garden and members as gardeners. Used under a CC-BY 4.0 licence. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.3332807.
Attend the June's Community Forum and Get to Know Our Steering Committee
The next monthly Community Forum is taking place on 19 June. This is your chance to connect with fellow community members, learn about Working Groups and projects, and contribute to discussions about the future of The Turing Way.
🗓️ Date: 19 June 2025 ⏰ Time: 14:00 to 15:30 UTC (start time in your timezone) 📝 Mark your calendar and 🔗 register to attend online
Fireside Chat with Our Steering Committee
A special highlight at June's Community Forum will be the Fireside Chat, creating an opportunity to learn more about The Turing Way Steering Committee members!
Meet the members of the Steering Committee.
At the last Community Forum, we announced the Steering Committee, joined by members representing different Working Groups and projects taking place within The Turing Way community, or in collaboration with other initiatives.
The Community Forum on 19 June is a chance to hear directly from them, understand their vision, and ask any questions you might have about governance, or how you can get more involved.
📝 Mark your calendar and 🔗 register to attend online
Whether you're a long-time contributor or new to our community - we look forward to seeing you there!
Important Updates from April's Community Forum
At our last Community Forum on 17 April, alongside the share-outs from different Working Groups, we shared a few important updates about The Turing Way governance.
We thank Batool Almarzouq for chairing this call and for all presenters and attendees for their contributions. Below we share important highlights - but you can catch up on the full discussion by watching/listening to the recording on YouTube.
The Turing Way Funding from The Turing Institute Comes to an End
Since 2019, The Turing Way has been generously supported by The Alan Turing Institute, which has provided funding to support the Project Delivery Team's roles and community events, and an affiliation that enabled us to nurture and scale our community-building and coordination efforts. This institutional funding has now come to an end.
As of June 2025, the Institute will no longer be financially supporting The Turing Way. Malvika announced this news at the Community Forum. She adds, "We are deeply grateful to The Alan Turing Institute for their foundational support, which has been crucial to The Turing Way's growth and success. We are proud that our work, developing globally recognised data science best practices through participatory approaches, now has strong community support. While this is a significant shift in how we think about maintenance and sustainability going forward, this produces an opportunity to transition to a sustainable model supported by multiple groups, communities, and organisations that contribute to and benefit from our project and community engagement."
Malvika has also shared a message for the community at the end of this newsletter. 💌
Project Delivery Team Members Transitioning in June
As part of this transition, Malvika shared that she will be leaving the Turing Institute in June, which also marks her last month in a funded role as The Turing Way Project Lead. Anne Lee Steele also shared that her role as Research Community Manager will also end in June.
Malvika has been working with Arielle Bennett, appointed as Senior Researcher for Open Source Practices. Arielle will lead the delivery of the next cohort of The Turing Way Practitioners Hub as part of the Turing-BridgeAI project. Léllé Demertzi will continue to work with Arielle and the BridgeAI team at the Turing.
Although this transition has limited the team's ability to currently support the wide range of projects we have in the past, they are committed to ensuring the day-to-day operations and community engagement of The Turing Way as the community members identify future support and funding.
Focusing on Providing Continuity
While working with the Steering Committee, the Project Delivery Team has focused on strengthening the following areas across the three-level governance:
- Community Level Governance: We are addressing gaps in our processes and updating the Community Handbook to ensure that community processes are clearly documented.
- Maintenance Level Governance: We are supporting the establishment of Community Management Working Groups for daily support, and a Fundraising Working Group to identify funding.
- Constitutional Level Governance: We are formalising a Steering Committee with chairs/representatives from Working Groups and collaborative projects to guide The Turing Way's strategic direction.
After facilitating the handover of leadership to the Steering Committee's elected chair and Secretary, members of the Project Delivery Team will engage in The Turing Way Steering Committee to represent Working Groups and initiatives they are involved in.
The Turing Way Fireside Chat Series in Collaboration with SSI
We are thrilled to announce a brand new series of The Turing Way Fireside Chat Series in collaboration with the Software Sustainability Institute (SSI)! Co-organised by Oscar Seip from SSI and Malvika and Arielle from The Turing Way, this series will explore different aspects of governance in open science and research.
The Community Forum on 19 June will launch the Fireside Chat series with a session with The Turing Way Steering Committee members. The remaining monthly calls, running from June to November 2025, will dive deep into the following crucial topics of governance:
- 26 June: What does Governance mean to us in Research and Open Science?, featuring insights from SSI leadership and Fellows.
- 31 July: Learning from Each Other's Journeys: Case studies from Open Initiatives, featuring leaders from communities like The Carpentries, rLadies, OLS and Jupyter.
- 28 August: Exploring Distributed, Collaborative and Decentralised Governance Models, featuring insights from The Climate Sensitive Infectious Disease Network (CSID Network), Open Research Community Accelerator (ORCA) and The Engine Room.
- 25 September: Governance frameworks, examples and resources from open source networks, featuring leaders from CURIOSS, CHAOSS and Open Source Research.
- 30 October: Good Governance Practices for the Long-Term Health of Open Initiatives, featuring researchers and leaders from Organizational Mycology and MetaDocencia.
- November: The series will wrap up at November's Book Dash. An announcement will be posted in our newsletter soon.
📝 Mark your calendar and 🔗 register to attend some or all the sessions
Contribute to the Fireside Chats
Unlike previous Fireside Chats, this year we will allocate 45 mins for speakers' discussion, followed by 45 minutes of interactions and dialogue between the speakers and attendees. So, if you are curious or have a lot of interest and experience in governance, join us - your presence will make a difference.
We are looking for folks who would like to co-facilitate, take notes, develop creative outputs or support these events in any way. You can express your interest in joining us by commenting under this GitHub issue #11.
The outcome of these events will be to gather insights and best practices that will directly inform the creation of resources in The Turing Way focused specifically on governance. November's Book Dash will be partly dedicated to documenting these references. To support this, you can join our Book Dash Working Group.
Welcoming Our New Community Management Working Group!
We are delighted to introduce the members of our newly formed Community Management Working Group! Facilitated by Anne Lee Steele and Léllé Demertzi, this dedicated group includes: Alejandro Coca-Castro, Johanna Bayer, Neha Moopen, Renee Hui Xin Ng, Sara Villa, Saranjeet Kaur, and Shern Tee.
In their first initial weeks, they are busy getting familiar with our community channels and processes and exploring areas where they can contribute. You will hear more about their work at the next community forum share-out.
We are incredibly excited about this new group and look forward to supporting their leadership within the community!
Broaden Participation with Our Accessibility Working Group
The Accessibility Working Group is exploring an opportunity to develop an application with a focus on accessibility in engagement and outreach as part of the Cognitive Science Society's "Broadening Participation in Cognitive Science Initiative" call. To make this a collaborative and supported effort within The Turing Way, we are inviting collaborations with researchers and practitioners from any career stage who would like to explore different ideas and lend their expertise in developing a proposal. Find more information about the call and reach out to our Accessibility Working Group chair Liz Hare via Slack. Please join the #accesibility channel on Slack for any questions and further discussions.
Updates from our May Book Dash and Collaborations Workshop!
This year, we hosted a two-part Book Dash event across two weeks in May, working together with our community members both in person and online across various sessions for collaborative writing, social networking and knowledge exchange.
Pre-Book Dash at Collaboration Workshop 2025
The first part of our Book Dash was hosted through a workshop at the Collaborations Workshop 2025 (CW25) in Stirling, Scotland. This in-person session introduced participants to The Turing Way, our motivations for Book Dash, and various ways they could contribute, sparking ideas for their own contributions.
Sitting in the front (left to right) are Léllé Demertzi, Batool Almarzouq, and Sara Villa. Standing behind (left to right) are Saranjeet Kaur, Jez Cope, Arielle Bennett, Emma Karoune, Malvika Sharan, and Esther Plomp. Screenshot on the right side (from top to bottom) are Precious Onyewuchi, Alexandra Araujo Alvarez, Elspeth Haston and Jim Madge who participated in the Hack Day working on The Turing Way.
The workshop was attended by both in-person and online attendees. It led to a full-day hack day event where other members joined to work on different aspects of The Turing Way, including improving the 'Pathways' feature, community handbook and data management chapters.
Thanks to the Book Dash Planning Committee (details about them in a section below) for making this event truly a supportive space for all attendees to engage with each other.
Hybrid Book Dash Events: 20-22 May
Our second Book Dash was a resounding success! Hosted remotely via Zoom on May 20th & 21st, it culminated in our vibrant Community Share-outs on May 22nd.
Over 30 participants joined us, contributing to 10 sessions and social events across the two days. We were thrilled to welcome first-time contributors: Brenda Yankam, Cecilia Baldoni, Chanju Park, Mouhamadoul Amine Daffe, Ngu Asanga, Onana Anicet, Sebastian Ayala Ruano, Serena Asu Besong Agbor, and Jyoti Bhogal, several representing our collaboration with Data Science Without Borders initiative.
Returning members included: Denise Bianco, Liz Hare, Lucy Stephenson, Precious Onyewuchi, Reshama Sheikh, Richard J. Acton, Sara Villa, Sarah Gibson, Saranjeet Kaur, Gigi Kenneth, Jim Madge, and Johanna Bayer. Onboarded, mentored, and supported by our dedicated Book Dash Planning Committee (named in the next section), participants tackled a range of topics -from improving infrastructure and documenting community processes to developing chapters. Their hard work resulted in an impressive 28 GitHub issues and 28 Pull Requests!
Thanks to Patricia for facilitating the treasure hunt, and Sara for facilitating the show and tell. Pictured above are screenshots from the treasure hunt social session.
Thanks to the Book Dash Working Group and the Planning Committee
Thanks to Arielle Bennett for chairing this year's Working Group, and the planning committee members Ale, Emma, Patrica, Esther, Léllé and Anne, who could gather in person in CW25, and Carlos Martinez and Seun Olufemi who supported at the planning stage. They creatively pivoted the plan for Book Dash this May to ensure that our community members can enjoy a supportive space for productive and engaging experiences within the community!
A special shout out to Precious who as part of the planning committee and a community manager for Data Science Without Borders (DSWB), held numerous 1:1s to onboard members from DSWB and support them in collaborative efforts, from writing new chapters to translating in French.
A huge congratulations to our incredible workshop hosts and the Book Dash planning committee for making these events possible.
Announcements from BridgeAI
Join The Turing Way Practitioners Hub's Next Cohort - Call for the UK's SMEs
The Turing Way Practitioners Hub invites UK-based organisations and small enterprises (SMEs) in data science and AI to submit Expressions of Interest for our second cohort of Experts in Residence (EiRs). As part of the InnovateUK BridgeAI, this cohort-based program helps organisations understand and adopt industry best practices in data science and AI.
📝 Apply via the Expression of Interest Form. The deadline is June 16, 2025.
From September 2025 to March 2026, the final cohort of the Practitioners Hub under the BridgeAI programme will be offered. Bringing together practitioners across agriculture & food production, construction & manufacturing, creative industries, transportation & logistics sectors, this will provide a forum for cross-sector collaboration, knowledge exchange, and strategic partnerships to accelerate AI adoption and best practices in open source, open data, cross-sector collaboration, research reproducibility, and ethical approaches. Learn more about this call and explore case studies from previous cohorts on the Turing website.
Attend the Next AI Insight Chat: Can the creative industries protect their IP in the Age of AI?
We are excited to announce the next AI Insight Chat, hosted by The Alan Turing Institute as part of the Innovate UK BridgeAI programme.
The next session will explore how AI is reshaping creative industries and the tools available to protect intellectual property.
Hosted Professor Keivan Navaie (Independent Scientific Advisor at The Alan Turing Institute), we will hear from speakers Natasha Ahmed (Partner at Akin) and Mary Stewart-David (Researcher in immersive technologies, Expert in Residence at The Turing Way Practitioners Hub). It’s a great opportunity for cross-sector insights on emerging challenges and solutions.
🗓️ Date and time: Thursday, June 26, 2025. 14:00 - 15:30 BST. 📝 Register to attend online
Don't miss this conversation exploring the security of creative assets in the age of AI.
Join the Portuguese Translation Group
In partnership with the Brazilian Reproducibility Network (RBR) and in close collaboration with The Turing Way Translation and Localisation Working Group, the Computational Reproducibility Bio (ReprodComputBio) project is seeking collaborators!
Led by Dr. Renato Santos as part of his eLife Community Ambassador activism, this initiative is developing a Portuguese translation of selected chapters from The Turing Way's "Guide to Reproducible Research," with a specific focus on computational reproducibility. The goal is to make these vital materials accessible to Portuguese-speaking audiences in countries like Brazil and Portugal.
Renato is looking for contributors for a second round of translation, taking place until September 2025. If you speak Portuguese or know early career bioscientists who do and might be interested in contributing, please join this valuable project!
Read about translation in The Turing Way and connect with us on Slack's #translation channel.
Congratulations to Hillary Juma and Pen-Yuan for their Recent Updates
Hillary Juma Seconded as the Artist Engagement and Insights Manager
Hillary Juma, a previous contributor of The Turing Way, recently shared that she has joined Attitude is Everything as their Artist Engagement and Insights Manager, where she will apply her experience working with The Turing Way.
She shared on her LinkedIn post: "Building on my work as the researcher for Next Stage Snapshot 2024 and Reviewer of Disabled Insights Report for the Musicians Census, I am building a data playbook inspired by The Turing Way - During my 9-month secondment I hope to challenge data ableism and utilise data analysis to reveal where power needs to shift for equity and justice for disabled folk in the music industry."
Pen-Yuan Hsing will join the AI Openness and Equity Policy Leadership Cohort
Pen-Yuan Hsing, an active contributor to The Turing Way Slack discussions, will be joining the Openness & Equity Policy Leadership Cohort.
In partnership with Mozilla, this programme by Aspiration Tech will bring together policy practitioners, advocates, academics, and technologists committed to shaping AI policies that work for people and the planet. Pen-Yuan, along with other participants will engage with the political and technical dimensions of openness in AI, working towards concrete recommendations and interventions that can inform AI policymaking in the EU and beyond.
We wish Hillary and Pen-Yuan all the best, and look forward to learning from their work in The Turing Way.
Upcoming events
📅 Subscribe to our community calendar and check out what's happening this month.
✨ If you are attending an event and would like to meet folks from across the community, please do share on Slack #community-discussion and #events channels.
Recurring Community Events and Calls ☕
Hosted throughout the month, our recurring community calls are important and engaging spaces where you can learn more about The Turing Way!
Some require sign-ups (📝) and some don't (✅), but absolutely all are welcome to these calls! ✨
- 📝 Community Onboarding Calls: The next call is scheduled for 30 July, 15:00-16:00 UK time (in your timezone). These calls are hosted every two months, join us to connect with other new members of the community and learn more about the project! Sign-ups are open.
- 📝 Community forums: The next call is on 19 June, 15:00-16:30 UK time (in your timezone). See below for more information. Sign-ups are open.
- ✅ Collaboration Cafe: The next call is on 4 and 18 June, 14:00-16:00 UK time (see in your time zone). Join the full or part of the call to collaborate on different ideas, do some focused writing, or get feedback on your ongoing work. Find more information on Etherpad.
- ✅ Community Management Working Group's Coworking Calls: Every Tuesday, 10:00 UK time (see in your time zone). Join the #cm-wg channel on Slack for more.
- ✅ Translation and Localisation Weekly Meetings: Calls at different time zones are hosted for co-working on translation and localisation efforts across several languages, and for learning more about the work of the team. Join the #translation channel on Slack for more.
- Onboarding for new members is hosted every other month on the last Wednesday at 11:00 UK time. The next one is scheduled on 30 July (in your time zone).
- ✅ Infrastructure Monthly Meetings: every second Tuesday of the month, at 16:00 UTC+1 (in your time zone). These calls are for co-working on infrastructure support, and for learning more about the work of the team. Join the #infrastructure channel on Slack for more.
- ✅ Accessibility Monthly Meetings: every second Monday of the month, at 17:00 UTC+1 (in your time zone). These calls are for planning monthly sprints and co-working on access-related chapters and upcoming guides. Join the #accessibility channel on Slack for more.
For updates from community members of events and opportunities from our network, please join #events and #jobs-and-opportunities channels on Slack.
It's been a busy few months of talks by and with community leaders. As always, you can find an ongoing record in our Zenodo Community page.
Message from Malvika
A New Chapter for The Turing Way (and for us!)
In 2019, I joined The Turing Way as a community manager. Since 2021, I have had the incredible privilege of co-leading it with Kirstie. Following Kirstie's departure from the Turing in late 2024, my focus shifted to guiding our Project Delivery Team through The Turing Way's transition from a flagship Turing project to an independent, community-governed initiative.
Over the last few months, working with the Project Delivery Team and our Steering Committee to establish governance processes has been an absolute honour. Their commitment to open, transparent, and empowered governance is truly inspiring!
This direction perfectly embodies what The Turing Way truly is: so much more than a project, a global and thriving collaborative community. While the changes announced in this newsletter mark the close of one significant chapter, they open the door to exciting new possibilities for us all.
As we move forward, I invite you to be an active part of this next discussion. Please share your ideas and suggestions on how you can contribute! Connect with us on Slack, share your thoughts on GitHub issue #4032, or email theturingway@gmail.com. You can also reach out to me; details on my webpage. Your engagement will continue to shape its future.
I'm immensely grateful for the opportunity to have worked with, supported, and grown alongside this incredible community. Thank you for your trust, and kindness, and for creating a brave space where I could learn to lead. I look forward to continuing to be a part of our community in a different capacity.
With gratitude,
Malvika Sharan, Alongside The Turing Way Project Delivery Team
Get involved + Connect with us!
You are welcome to join The Turing Way community, and learn more about the project.
- About the project
- The Turing Way book
- Start Page
- GitHub repository
- Slack Workspace
- Bluesky
- Mastodon profile
- YouTube Channel
If you'd like to contribute to the next newsletter, please email Anne Lee Steele at asteele@turing.ac.uk! Feel free to send her a message on Slack, or book some time in on Anne's calendly to say hello.
Did you miss the last newsletters? Check them out here.