The Community Surface Dynamics Modeling System (CSDMS) supports scientific research involving earth-surface processes: landslides, soil erosion, glaciation, river sedimentation, coastal change, sea-floor processes, and other natural phenomena that can impact human life and infrastructure. CSDMS focuses on the development and applications of computer models that help researchers and other professionals understand these processes and their potential impacts on human activity. The organization provides support in three main areas: community, computing, and education. Community-oriented activity includes maintaining an interactive online database for sharing of research software and other resources, hosting an annual scientific conference, and providing logistical support for workshops and related events. Computing-related services include developing software technology for running and coupling process models, hosting high-performance computing resources, providing technical computing assistance to scientists, and designing and promoting common standards and best practices for research software. Educational activities include summer schools in scientific computing for early-career researchers, workshops on various technical topics, and a web-based repository of online educational materials, such as animations, lecture slides, laboratory exercises, and “science-on-a-sphere” data sets.