# How We work – Hitchhiker's Guide to CorrelAid

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**Visit our** [**monthly onboarding call**](https://pretix.eu/correlaid/open-onboarding/) **to learn about how CorrelAid activities look like, how the organization is structured, and how you can get involved.**
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Our goal with CorrelAid is to democratize the potential of Data Science. In practice, we achieve this by supporting a network of over many data enthusiasts in Germany, by giving them the opportunity to grow, and by organizing pro-bono data science projects for civil society. But how do we work *internally*? This is an overview of how we organize ourselves at CorrelAid, how we work and which principles we follow.

## Our Code of Conduct and Code of Ethics

CorrelAid operates on a [Code of Ethics](https://correlaid.org/en/codeofethics) developed by the community, which guides our project decisions, shared goals, and desired interactions. This is also summarized in our [Code of Conduct](https://correlaid.org/en/codeofconduct).

Our goal is to empower data analysts and support collaboration with civil society through responsible and ethical data practices. In addition to respectful and non-discriminatory behavior, we value transparency, pragmatism, and self-determination.

## Our Impact

Our goal is to strengthen civil society and foster social engagement. To achieve this, we pursue three core impact goals:

1. Empower non-profit organizations to use data in a critical, reflective, and responsible way to better achieve their missions.
2. Enable effective engagement that creates value for non-profits while fostering self-efficacy, learning, and meaningful contribution among volunteer data scientists.
3. Support and promote the participation of marginalized groups within data science, advancing inclusion, equity, and diverse perspectives.

## Our Organization

We are formed as an association ("Verein" in German). In practice, however, the official organs of the association only have a secondary role. Instead, most of the structures we work in are informal, always potentially changing and ad-hoc.

### Structure

#### *The Assocation*

CorrelAid is legally organized as an association, whose core consists of its members, who come together at the annual general meeting. In addition to the general meeting, the [board](/wiki/board.md) determines the strategic direction of the association throughout the year. The ethics commission reviews the association’s activities with regard to general ethical values and becomes active upon request.

#### *The Remote Office Team*

The Remote Office Team consists of several full-time and part-time employees who support volunteer work, and implement various projects in the operational areas of education, data4good projects, and community. You can drop a message to the team via <info@correlaid.org>.

#### *The Volunteer Community*

We organize the volunteer community according to the crowd-crew-core principle:

* The **crowd** is made up of all the people who are part of our network and keep up to date with our work via our newsletters or Slack.
* Everyone who helps shape our activities is part of our **crew**. In addition to the data4good projects, this could be the data dialogues with civil society, various data literacy courses, participation in the mentoring program and much more.
* The **core** consists of the people who take responsibility for preparing and organzing the offers of CorrelAid: such as the board, the team leads, and our ethics committee.

### Communication

#### *Slack Workspace*

All our online communication takes place in our Slack Workspace. We have a channel for all important topics in which we organize our work. In addition, there are channels for technical questions and a channel for interesting links and projects. Our work takes place almost exclusively in public Slack channels. If you want to join our Slack Workspace, just drop a short email to <info@correlaid.org> or visit our [monthly onboarding call](https://pretix.eu/correlaid/open-onboarding/).

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[Slack Workspace](/wiki/communication/slack.md)
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#### *Newsletter*

Our volunteer newsletter provides you with all the relevant information about what's currently happening at CorrelAid and what volunteering opportunities are available. You can subscribe to it [here](https://dashboard.mailerlite.com/forms/257414/78748110521631819/share).

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[Newsletter](/wiki/communication/newsletter.md)
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