Code of Conduct

A Welcoming Space for Everyone

This project is fundamentally educational in purpose. It exists to make economics accessible, engaging, and enjoyable to students and curious minds of all backgrounds. We are committed to creating an environment where intellectual curiosity is celebrated, questions are welcomed, and every participant feels respected and valued.

We pledge to act and interact in ways that contribute to an open, welcoming, diverse, inclusive, and healthy community.

What Good Looks Like

Examples of behaviour that contributes to a positive environment include:

• Demonstrating empathy and kindness toward other people.
• Being respectful of differing opinions, viewpoints, and experiences.
• Giving and gracefully accepting constructive feedback.
• Accepting responsibility and apologising to those affected by our mistakes, and learning from the experience.
• Focusing on what is best not just for us as individuals, but for the overall community and educational mission of the project.
• Encouraging participation from people of all backgrounds, especially those new to economics.
• Using welcoming and inclusive language in all communications.
• Showing patience with learners at all levels of prior knowledge.

Who Is Responsible

Dr Rosnel Sessinou, as project maintainer and website owner, is responsible for clarifying and enforcing these standards of acceptable behaviour and will take appropriate and fair corrective action in response to any behaviour that is deemed inappropriate, threatening, offensive, or harmful.

Teachers and session facilitators who use this website in a classroom or workshop context are encouraged to share this Code of Conduct with participants and to uphold its principles throughout any session.

All users of this website — whether interacting with the content online or sharing or referencing it — are expected to abide by these standards.

Where This Applies

This Code of Conduct applies within all project spaces, including:

• This website and all its interactive experiences.
• Any communications about this project (emails, social media posts, academic references).
• Classroom or workshop sessions in which these materials are used.
• Any public space where an individual is representing the project or its community.

It also applies when an individual is officially representing the project in public spaces — for example, when using an official project email address, posting via an official social media account, or acting as an appointed representative at an online or offline event.

What Is Not Tolerated

Examples of unacceptable behaviour include:

• The use of sexualised language or imagery, and sexual attention or advances of any kind.
• Trolling, insulting or derogatory comments, and personal or political attacks.
• Public or private harassment of any individual.
• Publishing others' private information — such as a physical or email address — without their explicit permission.
• Deliberately misrepresenting the educational content of this website.
• Reproducing or redistributing the website's content in violation of the licence terms set out in the Legal Mentions & Licence.
• Other conduct which could reasonably be considered inappropriate in a professional or educational setting.

Consequences & Actions

The project maintainer will follow these steps when determining the consequences for any action deemed in violation of this Code of Conduct:

1. Correction — A private, written communication explaining the nature of the violation and why the behaviour was inappropriate, with a request to correct course.
2. Warning — A formal warning with consequences for continued behaviour. No further interaction with the people involved may be appropriate for a specified period.
3. Temporary restriction — A temporary restriction from any interaction or public communication associated with the project.
4. Permanent ban — A permanent ban from any form of public interaction within the project community, for the most serious or repeated violations.

All enforcement decisions will be made in good faith and with the aim of protecting the educational mission and community of the project. The project maintainer's decisions are final.

How to Report a Concern

If you witness or experience behaviour that violates this Code of Conduct, please report it promptly to the project maintainer:

All reports will be reviewed and investigated promptly and fairly. All project staff and maintainers are obligated to respect the privacy and security of the reporter. The project maintainer is committed to maintaining confidentiality with regard to the reporter of an incident.

If you feel a report has not been handled appropriately, you may also contact the University of Surrey through its standard conduct and complaints procedures.

About This Document

This Code of Conduct is adapted from the Contributor Covenant, version 2.1, a widely adopted standard for open-source and educational community standards.

This Code of Conduct is maintained by Dr Rosnel Sessinou, University of Surrey, SoSS-Economics, in support of the Discover Economics programme operated by the Royal Economic Society.

For questions about this Code of Conduct, contact Dr Sessinou via the contact page. For information about the licence governing this website's content, see the Legal Mentions & Licence page.