Priority 1: Engaging a Broader and More Diverse Community

At NCAR, we are committed to increasing the presence of underrepresented groups in our workforce and to creating an environment that welcomes a diversity of disciplines, ideas, scientific background, and approaches to problem solving. With a rich array of disciplines and a broad outreach component that spans all the laboratories, NCAR provides scientific information to stakeholders, policy makers, and the public. Through international programs, convocations of physical and social scientists, educators, and a wide range of disciplinary skills, NCAR demonstrates its commitment to engaging a broader community in the atmospheric sciences.

Accomplishments

Fostering a Welcoming Environment for NCAR Staff and Visitors

The NCAR director continues to advance efforts to increase the diversity at NCAR and recognizes the importance of diverse representation in management as well as in the scientific, technical, and administrative staff. At NCAR, we are committed to increasing the presence of underrepresented groups and to creating an environment that welcomes a diversity of disciplines, ideas, scientific background, and approaches to problem solving. NCAR is pleased to have two additional women in senior management roles. We recently formed an NCAR Diversity Committee which reports to the NCAR director and will continue to advance these efforts.

Through our visitor program, NCAR seeks to stimulate an intellectually diverse and healthy approach to our research. This $1M program brings national and international colleagues with diverse backgrounds to NCAR to collaborate, present new research results, and offer additional perspective to our on-going research. This year, NCAR hosted over 800 visitors with lengths of stay ranging from 1 day to over 6 months. Visitors come from as close as CU-Boulder and from as far away as Jakarta, Indonesia.

Mentoring Students from Underrepresented Groups

Our researchers and administrative staff were once again active mentors in the Significant Opportunities in the Atmospheric Research and Science (SOARS), a program operated by our manager the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR). This past summer, 16 NCAR employees served as science and technical mentors, 14 served as writing mentors, and 2 served as community mentors.

Student engineering programs

Our innovative Engineering Internships are targeted towards undergraduate engineering students who are interested in various aspects of developing and improving atmospheric observing systems. The Student Engineering Program in NCAR's Earth Observing Laboratory is another expression of NCAR's approach to diversity and seeks to offer a unique opportunity to undergraduate students interested in developing and improving atmospheric observing systems. The program, which celebrated its seventh year in FY 2006, supports summer interns to work both in Boulder and in field projects in the continental United States. To date, more than 20 engineering interns have participated. The program targets a diverse pool of students interested in various aspects of developing and improving atmospheric observing systems. When not in the field, the students work at the Boulder facility with NCAR's lead engineers, focusing on electrical, mechanical, aeronautical, and optical engineering challenges. Not only does NCAR benefit from having fresh new ideas in a variety of areas, the engineering students gain valuable experience as they focus their career goals.

This program, supported by NSF funds, will continue in FY 2007 with three to four new interns.

NCAR-funded Education and Outreach Activities

NCAR works in collaboration with and in support of activities in the UCAR Education and Outreach (EO) program. This year, EO has focused this year on developing and disseminating web-based bilingual (English and Spanish) science education resources. Building on the bilingual educational resources available through Windows to the Universe, EO developed an educational web site portal to the Mexico City-based MILAGRO field campaign and offered professional development to educators in Veracruz, Mexico, in collaboration with the Mexican Ministry of Education. NCAR scientists also collaborated with EO to produce resources made available through the portal, as well as to facilitate interactions with students and teachers in Veracruz.

Education and Outreach is actively disseminating information about this resource to local, national, and international Spanish-speaking and bilingual communities. Together, NCAR and EO have forged ties with the Mexican Ministry of Education and with numerous classroom teachers in Mexico, largely as a result of our involvement with the MILAGRO field campaign. We are also discussing expanded activities in other parts of Latin American, especially Chile, with science educators at UNESCO and in several countries in Central and South America. A new collaboration with the Colorado Department of Education's Immigrant Education Program will help EO to train bilingual teachers in the use of W2U resources in their classrooms.

In FY06, EO also supported NCAR's goal to translate the NCAR website into Spanish, with an emphasis on the top most pages of the site and those that share news with the public, in an effort to share information about NCAR science more broadly.

Enhancing International Connections

Through its activities this year, NCAR has forged new relationships with Central and South America in particular, while maintaining our strong ties to our North American, European, and Asian counterparts. Through the FY 2006 expansion of Climate Affairs regional centers in China and the creation of a Spanish Web site on El Nino Affairs, NCAR's Center for Capacity Building has helped to broaden NCAR's reach. Through rapidly expanding engagement with educators and the public in Latin American through the bilingual Windows to the Universe website (see below) and associated professional development events, NCAR is becoming recognized as a leader in geoscience education in Latin America. NCAR continues to build connections with international partners. This year, NCAR held the first in a series of planned interactions with students, professionals and researchers from Latin and South America. As part of the UCAR Africa Initiative to foster self-sustaining programs there, NCAR has also consolidated its activities by both working with partners in Africa and here at NCAR.

Program Plan

In FY 2007, NCAR will continue its collaboration with the Inter-American Institute for Global Change Research (IAI). NCAR will make two postdoctoral appointments to individuals from Central and South America and hold one or two short courses on GIS technology or the WRF model in an IAI member country.

NCAR research and administrative staff will again support the SOARS program and other UCAR diversity activities.

The NCAR Diversity Committee is working in collaboration with UCAR to build upon the success of the SOARS program and create NCAR opportunities for graduate students and postgraduates from underrepresented groups.

Professional Development for Bilingual Science Educators

In FY 2007, NCAR will support a professional development workshop on geoscience education offered at the 7th Annual Convention of Professors of the Natural Sciences in Puebla, Mexico, November 9-12, 2007. Soon thereafter, NCAR will support a professional development workshop (Bilingual Teachers Annual Resources Symposium, or “BSTARS”) for bilingual science educators in Colorado on November 29, 2007 at NCAR (with cosponsorship from the Colorado Department of Education and the Mexican Ministry of Education, Veracruz). A session at the Fall American Geophysical Union meeting on Interhemispheric Collaboration on Geoscience Education in Latin America has been convened by Education and Outreach, and will be followed by a session on Climate and Global Change Education and Capacity Building in Latin America, co-convened by EO and IAI.

NCAR will also continue to fund Spanish translation of NCAR website content into Spanish. With NCAR support, EO will add new content and Spanish translations to the Windows to the Universe site. New topics will enhance information and K-12 teacher resources related to the Earth's polar regions and the influence of the poles on our planet's climate. New Spanish language web resources will be shared with bilingual science teachers in workshops in the metro-Denver region, through the Windows to the Universe web site, and at regional and national meetings of science education organizations.