Announcing the CMX Summit Scholarship Program

Community is our life at CMX. We always want to give back and encourage everyone to be part of our community and we especially love seeing all of you at CMX Summit, our 2-day annual conference happening September 19-20 in Los Angeles.

While we're implementing many improvements to bring everyone together—from having one unified, annual conference to moving the location to LA for growth opportunity—we realize not everyone can afford to attend CMX Summit. Some of you may have been laid off recently. (I was in that boat last CMX Summit.) Some of you may work for tiny startups or nonprofits or are students just getting your feet wet in the world of community management. Or some others of you may also be from historically underrepresented groups who may not want to take a personal, monetary risk on CMX Summit.

That's why we're so excited to be able to offer the CMX Summit Conference Diversity and Inclusion Scholarship. We believe in taking actionable steps toward building diverse, accessible, and inclusive communities and conferences. And this is one of them!

Our scholarship program is here to encourage and recognize people of all races, ethnicities, genders, ages, abilities, religions, sexual orientations, military service, and more. To help break down the barriers that prevent underrepresented groups from participating at CMX Summit, we're offering scholarships to members of underrepresented groups in the community management industry. We will be providing 20 scholarships this year.

Let's give a round of applause to one of our sponsors, Shopify, for supporting this scholarship and making it possible for us to give scholarship recipients travel funds. All credit goes to Shopify, who, during our chats, specifically asked about inclusion and diversity programs they could support. We love partners who have strong values that go beyond just talk, but actually manifest themselves in action.

Since we're investing in LA as the new home of CMX Summit, half of our scholarships are set aside specifically for residences of the greater LA area. Please note, though, that LA recipients will have a reduced travel budget.

Okay, the scholarship goods!

1 non-transferable pass to CMX Summit 2017, happening September 19-20 in LA.

$600 to help offset the costs related to attending the conference such as travel, lodging, food, and childcare. If you are in the greater LA area, we offer $150 toward travel, food, and childcare.

Costs will be reimbursed by CMX, and recipients will need to keep expense receipts up to reimbursement limits.

Requirements

Must be a member of an underrepresented group in the community management field and at community management conferences, including but not limited to: people of color, people with visible and invisible disabilities, LGBTQA+, veterans, religious and ethnic minorities, trans, genderqueer, and nonbinary people, neurodiverse people, age minorities (under 21, over 50), and both working class people or people experiencing poverty.

Must be able to attend CMX Summit 2017 in person.

If employed, must work for a non-profit, startup, or company making less than $500,000 in annual revenue. (If you are having trouble convincing your boss, check out our ticket transparency post with cost and benefit breakdowns.)

Must be 18 years or older.

Must follow the CMX Summit Code of Conduct.

Some of the fine details: Applicants may not be awarded a CMX Summit's scholarship more than once. Scholarship recipients are responsible for arranging their own travel and lodging. Recipients are responsible for their own financial reporting. Due to limited availability, only one scholarship may be awarded per company. As cisgender women represent over 60% of attendees at CMX Summit, they are not considered an underrepresented group in our industry (kind of refreshing, isn't it?).

Application

All applications must be submitted by Friday, June 16 at 5pm PDT for CMX Summit 2017.

We're thrilled to to have these scholarships on offer. We will notify everyone who submits an application of our decision either way. If you have any questions or pontifications, please don't hesitate to reach out to us at [email protected]

Source: Announcing the CMX Summit Scholarship Program