Many thanks to the Burning Man Community for sharing these guiding principles:

Inclusion
Anyone can be a science student at COCC. We welcome and respect our fellow learners in this community. No prerequisites exist for participation in our community beyond a desire to learn.

Support
Our science community is devoted to acts of support for each other. Our support is unconditional. Support does not contemplate a return or an exchange for something of equal value.

Openness
In order to preserve the spirit of learning, our community seeks to create social environments that foster the free flow of ideas, information, and learning opportunities unmediated by monetization in any form. We stand ready to protect our culture from such exploitation.

Self-reliance
Our science community encourages the individual to discover, exercise and rely on his or her inner resources to facilitate and foster their learning.

Self-expression
Radical self-expression arises from the unique insight and perspective of the individual scientist. No one other than the individual or a collaborating group can define its form. Such insight and perspective is offered as a gift to others. In this spirit, the giver should respect the rights and liberties of the recipient.

Communal Effort
Our science community values creative cooperation and collaboration. We strive to produce, promote and protect social networks, public spaces, works of art and science, and methods of communication that support such interaction.

Civic Responsibility
We value civil society. Science community members who organize and participate in learning activities should assume responsibility for public welfare and endeavor to communicate civic responsibilities to participants. They must also assume responsibility for conducting any learning activities in accordance with local, state and federal laws.

Leaving No Trace
Our science community respects the environment. We are committed to leaving no physical trace of our activities wherever we gather. We clean up after ourselves and endeavor, whenever possible, to leave such places in a better state than when we found them.

Participation
Our science community is committed to a radically participatory ethic. We believe that transformative change, whether in the individual or in society, can occur only through the medium of deeply personal participation. We achieve being through doing. Everyone is invited to work. Everyone is invited to play. We make the world real through actions that open the heart and mind.

Direct Experience
Direct experience and observation is, in many ways, the most important touchstone of value in our community culture. We seek to overcome barriers that stand between us and a recognition of our inner scientist, the reality of the universe around us, participation in society, and contact with a natural world which is our quest to understand. No idea can substitute for this experience.