PREFACE
On behalf of the university community, the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR) proposes to the National Science Foundation (NSF) to continue managing and operating the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR). This document is submitted to NSF in support of a proposed cooperative agreement with UCAR for the period 1 October 1998 to 30 September 2003.
This proposal focuses on our vision of the research and facility activities for the five-year period under consideration, in addition to describing management strategies, philosophy, and structure. The document describes the planning environment, outlines future research thrusts and facilities plans, discusses special initiatives and challenges for the next five years, and describes how UCAR and NCAR management will guide and carry out these activities. The proposal provides the information upon which reviewers may judge the intellectual merit of NCAR's plans and the broad impacts of UCAR and NCAR on the national and worldwide scientific community, in keeping with the new NSF criteria.
NSF has conducted extensive reviews of NCAR and UCAR over the past two years. In 1996, the third year of the present five-year cooperative agreement, each NCAR division was evaluated by anonymous mail reviewers and by an NSF-appointed on-site review panel whose members were from universities and research laboratories. In 1997 the entire NCAR program and NCAR and UCAR management were reviewed by a panel chaired by Charles Kennel (Provost, University of California-Los Angeles).
1 These reviews, which focused on past performance and achievements, form the background for the current proposal.
In support of this proposal, we append NCAR -- Science, Facilities, and Service, written for the fourth-year review by NCAR and UCAR management with the UCAR Board of Trustees. This accomplishment-based document stands as a record of our past achievements and should be considered in conjunction with the current proposal.
The vision contained in this proposal is shared by NCAR and UCAR management, NCAR's scientific, technical, and support staff, and university colleagues. The collective nature of this vision is emblematic of UCAR's greatest strength: serving as the voice that represents the university community in the management and oversight of the national center.
New NSF review criteria
- What is the intellectual merit of the proposed activity?
The following are suggested questions to consider in assessing how well the proposal meets this criterion:
- How important is the proposed activity to advancing knowledge and understanding within its own field and across different fields?
- How well qualified is the proposer (individual or team) to conduct the project?
- To what extent does the proposed activity suggest and explore creative and original concepts?
- How well conceived and organized is the proposed activity?
- Is there sufficient access to resources?
- What are the broader impacts of the proposed activity?
The following are suggested questions to consider in assessing how well the proposal meets this criterion:
- How well does the activity advance discovery and understanding while promoting teaching, training, and learning?
- How well does the proposed activity broaden the participation of underrepresented groups (e.g., gender, ethnicity, geographic, etc.)?
- To what extent will it enhance the infrastructure for research and education, such as facilities, instrumentation, networks, and partnerships?
- Will the results be disseminated broadly to enhance scientific and technological understanding?
- What may be the benefits of the proposed activity to society?
1 Other members of the NSF panel were David Burridge, Director of the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasting; Jay Davis, Director of the Environmental Programs Directorate at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory; Timothy Killeen, Professor, University of Michigan; James Rasmussen, Director of NOAA's Environmental Research Laboratories; Carol Roberts, former Deputy Division Director of NSF Polar Programs; and Ron Prinn, Professor, MIT.
