UNIVERSITY CORPORATION FOR ATMOSPHERIC RESEARCH
Annual Members' Meeting
12–13 October 1999
Boulder, Colorado

MINUTES

TUESDAY, 12 OCTOBER

1. CALL TO ORDER, WELCOME AND AGENDA REVIEW

The Annual Meeting of the UCAR Members was called to order by Trustee Chairman Len Fisk at 1:00 pm on Tuesday, 12 October, in the Main Seminar Room at the Mesa Laboratory in Boulder, Colorado. Fisk welcomed members of the UCAR Board of Trustees, Members' Representatives (56 of the 63 institutions were represented), Academic Affiliates' representatives, members of the University Relations Committee, NSF colleagues and guests. After reviewing the agenda, it was regularly moved, seconded, and passed to adopt the agenda for the 12-13 October Members' meeting as presented.

Present for all or portions of the meeting were the following Members' Representatives and officially-appointed substitutes:

Present for all or portions of the meeting were the following Academic Affiliates:

2. SECRETARY'S REPORT

In Secretary Ron Smith's absence, Jack Fellows, Vice President for Corporate Affairs, asked for approval of the minutes from the October 1998 Annual Members' Meeting. It was regularly moved, seconded, and passed to adopt the minutes as submitted.

3. TREASURER'S REPORT

Treasurer Lyn Hutton presented the Consolidated Statement of Funding and Expenditures for eleven months, ending on 31 August 1999. She noted that we have received the majority of FY99 funding from NSF, with an increase of $7M, $3M of which is for the refurbishment of the Mesa Lab. The General Fund continues to increase, benefiting from a very positive investment climate. The balance in the investment portfolio is being changed per recommendations by the Audit and Finance Committee in July. Further diversification is being done by investing more heavily in global and international funds. Hutton also reported that UCAR has an increased number of higher risk projects this year, and as a result, prespending is being watched very closely. It was regularly moved, seconded, and passed to receive the Treasurer's report.

4. ELECTION OF AUDITORS

Treasurer Hutton stated that because Deloitte and Touch have been our auditors for a number of years, the Board looked at other audit firms before deciding to recommended re-engaging Deloitte and Touche for the FY00 audit. However, UCAR will change audit managers. It was regularly moved, seconded, and passed to elect Deloitte and Touche as UCAR's corporate auditors for FY00.

5. RICHARD GREENFIELD AND ROBERT SERAFIN REMARKS

This time on the agenda was provided for remarks by Richard Greenfield, recently retired as ATM/NSF Director, and Robert Serafin, who is retiring as NCAR Director in 2000.

A. Richard Greenfield Remarks

Greenfield said he is taking a new position at the American Meteorological Society, leading the recently established Atmospheric Policy Program (APP). During remarks to the Members, he said that there is no comprehensive approach to atmospheric policy studies and no systematic body of scholarly work in this area, nor are there any institutions where students and professionals can be exposed to, and educated in, the complexities of atmospheric policy. This program hopes to fill some of those gaps. The general goals of this program will be to: ensure broad support of students; conduct research on public policy issues and provide education on those issues; contribute to informed policy decisions; and help develop a new generation of leaders who appreciate the complexity of atmospheric sciences and can help make more informed decisions on issues relating to the atmosphere. Establishment of a Congressional Fellows Program, summer colloquium, seminars and course materials would be part of the overall program to educate the graduate students, mid-career professionals and non-meteorology professionals who would participate in the APP. (Further details on the APP can be found at http://www.ametsoc.org/AMS/atmospolicy/appdescription.html ).

B. Robert Serafin Remarks

NCAR Director Robert Serafin said that NCAR is in good shape and has more collaborative projects and programs with the universities than ever before. This is due partly to the oversight of the URC which has helped produce more collaboration and more diversity in the programs and disciplines. NCAR is taking a leadership role in computing. There is also an increased understanding of the societal relevance of our science as well as a broadened educational mission during his tenure as Director. The quality of field programs such as the recent Mesoscale Alpine Program (MAP) is very high. Recognition of the caliber of NCAR staff by the community continues. In the future, Serafin said he foresees greater integration of observational systems, data, information technology, research and operations, and stronger collaborations with scientists around the world.

Following Serafin's report, Fisk read the following Board of Trustees Resolution of Appreciation which had been passed at the UCAR Board of Trustees Meeting the previous day.

Resolution of Appreciation for Robert J. Serafin

WHEREAS, Bob Serafin has announced his decision to step down as Director of NCAR on February 1, 2000; and

WHEREAS, this will mark Bob's 26th year at NCAR and 10 years as NCAR's Director; and

WHEREAS, during his tenure, he has tirelessly advocated and promoted NCAR's interests and accomplishments, expanding the program in atmospheric and related sciences and supporting the development, acquisition and deployment of state-of-the-art facilities in service to NCAR and the broader university and research related community;

WHEREAS, his keen mind, his leadership skills, and his superb grasp of the scientific and administrative complexities of this organization, and indeed of the whole of the geosciences' discipline, have clearly advanced our communities' resources and capabilities;

NOW, THEREFORE, LET IT BE RESOLVED, that the members of the Board of Trustees, along with the UCAR staff who have worked so closely with Bob, express to him their deeply felt thanks for his leadership these past ten years as Director of NCAR and wish him all the best in the years ahead.

God Speed, Bob!

6. SCIENCE ADVOCACY: SHAPING THE FUTURE

UCAR President Richard Anthes said that UCAR has been very active this past year in advocating for a strong science budget in this country. He acknowledged Lewis-Burke Associates in Washington; Kathryn Schmoll, Vice President of Finance & Administration, and Fellows for their hard work in this area. Anthes said that the large number of community members who have responded to his congressional action alerts have made a difference.

Anthes presented giant pencils as gifts and reminders of their efforts and communications to Congress to Gary Ostrander (John Hopkins U), Fred Stafford (U of Chicago) and Ben Herman (U of Arizona). Anthes reported that Ghassam Asrar, Director of NASA's Earth Science office, said that the letters and phone calls from the community improved the outcome of the NASA budget. Anthes encouraged more Members' Representatives to communicate with their members of Congress, to become involved in briefings on the Hill, to visit their Congressional members and staff, and to testify before Congress. He asked the Members and Affiliates to contact Fellows, Cindy Schmidt, Laura Curtis, or himself with their interest..

Trustee David Skaggs then discussed the importance of building relationships with your Congresspeople, especially the staff who deal with scientific issues. He distributed a booklet called Proactive Atmospheric Legislative Strategy (PALS) which offered guidelines on staying in touch with Congressional members and staff. We need to help them see why they should pay attention to science issues. UCAR, being in the health, safety and survival business, is very significant to the welfare of this country and its citizenry, said Skaggs.

7. UCAR FORUM: PLENARY

Fisk reviewed the schedule of the forum and also the schedule for the next year. He said that this is an opportunity not only to celebrate the 40^th anniversary of UCAR, but also to engage the community in deciding the priorities and challenges facing the community in the future. Input from today's forum will be used to help design a survey to be sent to the community during the next year.

A. Keynote Address - John Firor

Chairman Fisk read the following Resolution for Dr. John Firor, the next speaker, which conferred on him the title of NCAR Senior Scientist and Director Emeritus. The Board of Trustees passed the following resolution unanimously at their morning meeting.

Resolution of Appreciation for John W. Firor

WHEREAS, John Firor has served UCAR and NCAR with distinction and grace for 38 years. During those years, he has served as Director of the High Altitude Observatory, Director of NCAR, Executive Director of NCAR, and later as the Director of NCAR's well-respected Advanced Study Program. John is an internationally regarded expert on public policy issues related to the atmospheric sciences-particularly climate change and sustainable development.

WHEREAS, John's clear mind, keen perceptions, and warm sense of humor have guided the organization well, and provided a role model for countless scientists and administrators. Specifically, his steady influence and wise counsel over the years have helped to weave societal concerns into the fabric of NCAR science.

NOW, THEREFORE the Trustees of the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research with great pleasure on the 12th day of October 1999 recognize John's accomplishments and confer on him the title of Senior Scientist and NCAR Director Emeritus. We offer our sincere gratitude for his work over the years, and expect continued association for many more. John has distinguished himself, and thus, this organization through his association with it.

Thank you, John!

Using the evolution of the NCAR and UCAR mission statements, Firor gave a history of NCAR, marking its development as an intellectual center, and as part of the general intellectual activity in atmospheric research in this county. He said there are at least two kinds of trends that should, and do, influence the NCAR mission--trends in the nature of the science we are engaged upon, and changes that occur in the political, financial, and institutional context in which the work is to be carried out. He strongly urged that "NCAR continue to expand its efforts to assemble, from universities or where ever the skills reside, the groups needed to match our science more closely to the real world so that we can be an important force in showing the human race how it can live in long term harmony with this marvelously intricate world in which we find ourselves."

B. Board on Atmospheric Sciences and Climate (BASC) Report - John Dutton

John Dutton (Penn State), Chairman of the UCAR Foundation, briefly reviewed the Board on Atmospheric Sciences and Climate (BASC) report, "The Atmospheric Sciences - Entering the 21^st Century", and its recommendations for contributions to the national well-being in four areas: protection of life and property; maintaining environmental quality; enhancing national economic vitality; and, strengthening fundamental understanding. He stated that although true interdisciplinary work continues to be difficult, it is a critical factor to the future of atmospheric sciences.

C. "NSF Geosciences Beyond 2000 - Understanding and Predicting Earth's Environment and Habitability" - Robert Corell

Robert Corell, Assistant Director, GEO/ATM/NSF, reviewed the report, "NSF Geosciences Beyond 2000 - Understanding and Predicting Earth's Environment and Habitability". Corell said there are four issues that get the attention of Congress: (a) health; (b) safety for people and institutions from natural hazards that challenge investments; (c) jobs and the environment; and (d) climate. He said that these issues have to move out of the political arena and into the everyday lives of people and institutions. The atmospheric sciences must integrate with other sciences to focus on scientific problems and environmental issues, enhance disciplinary research, strengthen interdisciplinary research, and increase long-term research support. The priorities for GEO are science, infrastructure, new technology, new partnerships, and education.

D. Break-Out Session.

The Members, Affiliates and the URC broke out into the following sessions:

Protection of Life and Property - co-chairs: Maura Hagan (HAO/NCAR) and Kelvin Droegemeier (U of Oklahoma)

Maintaining Environmental Quality - co-chairs: Linda Mearns (ESIG/NCAR) and Ken Demerjian (SUNY, Albany)

Enhancing National Economic Vitality - co-chairs: Bob Harriss (ESIG/NCAR) and Jerry North (Texas A&M)

Strengthening Fundamental Understanding - co-chairs: Guy Brasseur (ACD/NCAR) and Kerry Emanuel (MIT)

WEDNESDAY, 13 OCTOBER

8. NOMINATING COMMITTEE REPORT

Chairman Fisk outlined the legal and fiduciary responsibilities of the Trustees as an introduction to the Nominating Committee Report. Otis Brown, Chairman of the Nominating Committee, reported that the Nominating Committee met in Boulder on 27 May 1999 with all members in attendance. A mail survey had been conducted to solicit suggestions for nominations from the Members' Representatives and others for Trustee and Member committee slates; the results were compiled and provided to the Committee in advance of the meeting. The following slates were the result of their deliberations:

The slate of Institutional Trustees and Trustee-at-Large is as follows:

Institutional Trustee Candidates:

Otis Brown - University of Miami, Rosenstiel School
Candace Corvey - University of New Hampshire
Chester Gardner - University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Charles Kennel - University of California at San Diego, Scripps Institution of Oceanography
Mary Jo Richardson - Texas A&M University
Ronald Smith - Yale University
Soroosh Sorooshian - University of Arizona

Trustee-at-Large Candidate:

Ronald McPherson, American Meteorological Society

Fisk reviewed and recommended the voting procedure used in the past several years

The four candidates receiving the highest majorities will be elected Trustees. If all four positions are filled on the first ballot, the election is complete. If fewer than four Trustees are elected on the first ballot, then the name(s) of those so elected will be removed from the ballot, and an additional ballot or ballots will be taken until all Trustee positions are filled.

It was regularly moved, seconded, and passed to adopt the voting procedure as proposed.

Fisk then recommended that Steve Dickson and Kathy Strand be appointed as tellers. It was regularly moved, seconded, and passed to appoint Steve Dickson and Kathy Strand as tellers.

Fisk recommended adoption of the slate of Trustee candidates. It was moved and seconded to close the nominations, and to adopt the slate. There being no nominations from the floor, the motion passed.

Election results were announced later in the meeting but are reported here for convenience:

Institutional Trustees:

Otis Brown	Mary Jo Richardson
Charles Kennel	Ronald Smith

Trustee-at-Large

Ronald McPherson

The following nominations were submitted for UCAR Members' committees:

Membership Committee (Three-year Term)

James Coakley - Oregon State University
Walter Robinson - University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Sepideh Yalda - Millersville University of Pennsylvania
Continuing members of the Membership Committee are:
Keith Aldridge - York University (2001)
Richard Gammon - University of Washington (2000)
Gregory Nastrom - St. Cloud State University (2000)
Joyce Penner - University of Michigan (2000)
Mary Jo Richardson, Chairwoman - Texas A&M University (2001)

University Relations Committee (Three-Year Term)

Kenneth Pickering - University of Maryland
Seth Stein - Northwestern University
Gene Takle - Iowa State University

Continuing members of the University Relations Committee are:

Robin Bell - Lamont-Doherty (2000)
Eric Betterton - University of Arizona (2000)
Chris Bretherton - University of Washington (2001)
Richard Clark - Millersville University of Pennsylvania (2000)
Judy Curry - University of Colorado (2000)
Jeff Dozier - University of California, Santa Barbara (2000)
Kelvin Droegemeier, Chairman - University of Oklahoma (2001)
Matthew Hitchman - University of Wisconsin-Madison (2001)
Mingfang Ting - University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (2001)

Members' Nominating Committee (One-Year Term)

Otis Brown - University of Miami, Rosenstiel School
Arthur Few - Rice University
Matthew Hitchman - University of Wisconsin-Madison
John Merrill - University of Rhode Island
Suzanne Paulson - University of California, Los Angeles
Paola Rizzoli, Chairwoman - Massachusetts Institute of Technology

There were no nominations from the floor. It was moved, seconded, and passed to elect the slate of Members' committees as submitted.

9. MEMBERSHIP COMMITTEE REPORT

Mary Jo Richardson (Texas A&M), Chairwoman of the Membership Committee, reported on the committee's activities: the review of application materials for the 10 universities up for Membership renewal. She reviewed the Membership Criteria and reported that the Committee recommended re-election of the following universities to UCAR Membership for eight-year terms beginning in January 2000. It was moved, seconded, and passed to re-elect the California Institute of Technology, University of California-Davis, Georgia Institute of Technology, McGill University, Naval Postgraduate School, University of Nevada, University of New Hampshire, Oregon State University, Purdue University, and Utah State University.

10. UNIVERSITY RELATIONS COMMITTEE REPORT

After summarizing the charge to the committee, and acknowledging the members of the URC, Chairman Kelvin Droegemeier pointed out that one of the URC's main activities over the years has been to review NCAR's and UOP's non-core proposals. The committee found that the past year's proposals have met the established guidelines with need expressed for more letters from external collaborators. Also noted by the committee was the rising number of joint proposals with universities and proposals for instrumentation development.

The NCAR Advanced Study Program postdoctoral selection process was also a topic addressed by the URC, especially the disproportionate number of postdocs selected from the University of Colorado. The committee concluded that while there was a bias toward CU for geographical reasons, the current selection process should be maintained with more effort, both from UCAR and the universities, placed in advertising the positions so a broader pool of candidates will be identified. The URC also continued to address instrumentation development at universities, and reviewed the UCAR Advocacy plans. Droegemeier said that in this coming year the committee will be involved in advocating graduate study in the atmospheric sciences and in educating the university committee on the programs and opportunities that exist at NCAR/UCAR .

11. APPROPRIATIONS UPDATE AND UCAR ADVOCACY STRATEGY REPORT

April Burke, Lewis-Burke Associates, updated the Members on the Federal budget and science funding issues. The NSF budget is healthy, she said, and includes $10M for the HIAPER aircraft. Much of the increase in the NSF budget is in information technology and biocomplexity. Regarding the NASA budget, Burke said, although the budget looked bleak early on, the community's input helped to turn that around.

Fellows reviewed the list of advocacy items approved by the BOT at their July meeting and reviewed the overarching principles used in selecting the advocacy activities to pursue:

(a) It needs to be relevant to the entire community;

(b) With our limited resources, we want to focus on areas where we have a good chance of positively influencing the outcome of legislation.

Fellows asked for feedback from the Members on the list of advocacy items and also asked them to contact either himself or Schmidt with additional suggestions. The BOT makes the final decision on what items are supported. Fellows thanked the Members for their participation in the advocacy efforts this past year and expressed his hope that more Members will participate this next year.

12. STATUS REPORTS

A. UCAR Board of Trustee's Chairman's Report

Chairman Fisk updated the Members on the following issues:

- Legislative activities: Fisk said that, in his opinion, this community has positively influenced Congressional action this budget cycle, especially related to NSF and NASA allocations-and that we should "keep it up."

- Code Assessment Panel: UCAR/NCAR responded to this report, and is now writing a strategic plan for large-scale simulation in response to the report's recommendations.

- The BOT took action on a number of personnel issues: they approved the 3% salary increase range movement and the 4% overall salary budget; they approved the new Senior Scientists Elliot Atlas, James Hack, Robert Harriss, and Doug Nychka and the new Affiliate Scientists, Michael Newchurch and Bjorn Stevens.

- NRC Ranking Study: This may be pursued in the Spring of 2000. UCAR may have a role in the preliminary information gathering and implementation decisions prior to the survey development.

- COSMIC: Fisk reported that, due to the nature of possible financial risk involved, the Board urged UCAR to proceed cautiously with this project, and wishes to hear status updates at each Board meeting.

- AMS/UCAR Congressional Fellowship: At the request of the AAAS, UCAR and the AMS made the concession to drop UCAR from the Fellowship title and call it the AMS Congressional Fellowship. UCAR will continue, however, to be involved in the activity, and will be a co-sponsor along with the AMS.

- 40th Anniversary Celebration and Forum: Next year will be UCAR/NCAR's 40th anniversary, NSF's 50th, and HAO's 60th anniversary. The Forum discussions at the Members' Meeting will kickoff the events of a year-long celebration.

- Advocacy Activities: The focus in the upcoming months will be on educating the presidential candidates. The AMS and UCAR will jointly prepare a "awareness document" for candidates' use, and to educate them on weather and climate issues. A somewhat longer document will be prepared for the next Administration's transition team.

- Student Recruitment Issues: the Board is concerned about declining graduate school enrollments and possibly about a decline in the quality of graduate students. UCAR Trustees under the leadership of David Houghton, Dennis Thomson and Gabor Vali are investigating these issues.

- The BOT presented Anthes with a special award to recognize the outstanding job he has done, and is doing as President of UCAR.

B. ATM/NSF Report

Cliff Jacobs, Section Head of UCAR and Lower Atmospheric Facilities Section, ATM/NSF, reported on the following items:

- Selection of Margaret Leinen (U of Rhode Island) as the new Geosciences Assistant Director. She will begin her new position in January 2000.

- Search process for ATM Director: The search committee will pare down the applicant list in early November and, a selection will likely be made before the end of this year. The selection will be done in consultation with NSF Director Rita Colwell and Leinen.

- The NSF FY2000 budget: NSF's FY2000 budget of $3,910M is an increase of 6.5% over FY99, with Research and Related receiving a 7.1% increase ($200M) and MRE 5.5%. Jacobs pointed out that $240M of Research and Related's budget are earmarked funds, and that the MRE account received an additional $10M for HIAPER and $36M for terrascale computing.

- Overview of the recent NSF Code Assessment Panel review and report: Jacobs reported that a panel was convened to assess performance and scalability of large simulation codes at NCAR. The panel recommended, among other things, that NCAR develop a vision for computational science leadership in support of its science mission, addressing issues of hardware plans, software development and practices. The panel asked that NCAR strengthen its computational science technologies by re-examining the mix of computational scientists and applied mathematicians.

- FASTLANE: FastLane is an interactive real-time system used to conduct NSF business over the Internet. Jacobs asked the Members to please provide feedback on FASTLANE and how it is working for them.

C. UCAR President's Report

UCAR President Richard Anthes, after noting that his, and the NCAR and UOP Directors' complete reports are on the web, reported on the following UCAR, NCAR and UOP activities and issues:

- Academic Affiliates: Anthes said this group is a very valuable part of the community. They have a big impact on the quality and quantity of graduate students going into the atmospheric and related sciences' Ph.D. programs.

- COSMIC: Major progress is being made on the science and developing algorithms for open-loop tracking of the GPS radio signals in the lower atmosphere. However, the negotiations for the contract with Taiwan are proving to be more difficult.

- Boulder Research and Administrative Network (BRAN): BRAN is an 11 mile fiber-optic network between UCAR, NOAA, NIST, CU and the City of Boulder and is slated to be fully operational by or before May 2000.

- Finance and Administration activities: Y2K planning is on schedule and contingency plans are being developed; Mesa Lab refurbishment is progressing; UCAR's FY2000 Indirect Rate Proposal was approved by NSF in record time, and early next year, F&A staff are slated to move to a different site because of scientific divisions' need for space at Foothills lab.

- SOARS update: This highly successful program, in its fourth year with 40 universities participating, had 24 students this past summer participating in the ten-week summer internship component of SOARS. A video featuring SOARS proteges and mentors will be ready for broadcast and classroom use early in 2000.

- HIAPER: This advanced airborne research platform was appropriated $10M in FY2000 from NSF's MRE fund. A website has been developed to allow the scientific community to monitor the progress of this acquisition and can be found at http://www.atd.ucar.edu/dir_off/hiaper/index.html. Anthes said HIAPER was possible only because of the tremendous amount of preparation done by the staff at NCAR and the input from the community.

- Supercomputing Update: A history of supercomputing was given, culminating with the most recent acquisition in August, an IBM RS/6000 SP ("blackforest"). This acquisition is the first step in the move toward clustered computing and the "blackforest" will be available for production computing by early October.

- ACD Director Search Process: Brasseur will step down as ACD Director the first of January 2000 to take the position of Director at the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology in Hamburg. A search committee, chaired by Susan Solomon (NOAA), has been selected and the position will be advertised in a number of pertinent publications.

- NCAR Director Search: The search committee, chaired by Joe Klemp (MMM/NCAR), hopes to announce a new director by February/March 2000. The position, with a soft closing date of 1 October, has been widely advertised and the committee has been pro-active in seeking applications.

- COMET: The 10th anniversary of COMET will be celebrated this year. COMET supports a web-based education and training program for NWS as well as creating new CDs and web-based modules.

- PAGE: PAGE is developing a Geosciences Digital Library which will help faculty find, evaluate, use and create resources that support active learning in undergraduate Earth systems science. Also under development is the Virtual Exploratorium project which will develop/test a prototype undergraduate learning model centered on scientific visualization and provide needed tools/training to use the model.

- VSP: This is the 10^th year of the VSP and there are over 70 postdocs with up to 20 new postdoc opportunities possible for the coming year.

- JOSS: Current and ongoing field projects include the Indian Ocean Experiment (INDOEX), Mesoscale Alpine Program (MAP), CODIAC data management system, Aerosol Characterization Experiment (ACE)

- Unidata: There is a huge growth in Internet Data distribution and new data sets continue to be added.

- Suominet: This real-time, university-based, national GPS network for atmospheric and geoscience research has been funded by NSF.

- IITA - This program is helping UCAR adapt to new information technologies.

13. UCAR FORUM: PLENARY

The Co-Chairs of the four break-out sessions presented the reports of discussions held the day before.

A. Protection of Life and Property - Kelvin Droegemeier (University of OK and Maura Hagan (HAO/NCAR)

Droegemeier reported on the Protection of Life and Property group's discussion and the role that universities and UCAR/NCAR/UOP might play. Following are issues which need to be addressed.

- Establish partnerships with the private sector while engaging the agencies.

- Assess the needs of users, including commercial and citizens.

- Develop specific goals to meet the needs.

- Craft a research agenda that responds to the prioritized goals.

- Conduct understanding-driven research, ideally in partnership with the operational community and the end-users.

- Conduct proof of concept testing to prove viability of new techniques and systems.

- Convey knowledge and share technological advances (research to operations).

- Iterate on the process, assess and improve.

Science cannot continue to be "business as usual". Barriers to progress include:

- Ineffective and few paths to operations.

- Interagency interactions and cooperation.

- Walls between the private sector and other communities.

- Historical inertia must be overcome; open mindedness must prevail as well as being open to new technologies. Opportunities as well as challenges must not be bypassed.

And finally, Droegemeier noted that the group thought that community models must be evaluated and validated to establish confidence in them. Information from the science community must be better distributed to the public.

B. Maintaining Environmental Quality - Linda Mearns (ESIG/NCAR and Ken Demerjian (SUNY-Albany)

Mearns summarized the Maintaining Environmental Quality group's discussion. She reported that although they were a diverse group, the consensus was that improvement in interdisciplinary research and integration of research was critical. They also agreed that there is a lack of mechanisms for fostering this kind of research within NSF as well as fostering appropriate coordination across agencies and programs. There is a need for interdisciplinary data access and integration of data sets. There is no integrated system to make data available to the broader community and to explain how to access and use the data.

Related to the data issue is instrumentation and how to create instrumentation for use by a number of disciplines to get more "bang for the buck". The TOGA-COARE project is a good example of instrumentation created to serve a variety of research purposes. What's lacking is training for instrument specialists and users of the resulting observations (perhaps have a traveling instrumentation class?). Also needed is further integration of observations with modeling needs in the appropriate temporal and spatial scales.

The group asked if the atmospheric community has pushed the envelope enough in developing new technology and discussed how to stimulate dialogue between this community and the technical development community. A key concern was to be able to make observations in one discipline that can be well understood in another discipline. NOAA's Human Dimensions Program was discussed as a small example of working across disciplines.

C. Enhancing National Economic Vitality - Robert Harriss (Director-ESIG/NCAR)

Harriss reviewed the Enhancing National Economic Vitality group's discussions, which focussed on three areas: (1) strategic alliances (2) learning how to work with partners in developing alliances (3) human resources.

(1) Strategic alliances: broader and deeper strategic alliances in business and the public policy sector are needed to understand the public need. The process of building partnerships must be based on a continuous dialogue. Start with obvious industries such as agriculture, energy, transportation and look at which research and technologies that will best serve that industry. For example, key technologies which would assist agribusiness industry are such things as global positioning satellites, continuous yield measurements, remote sensing, high precision weather information, and geographic information systems.

(2) Learning how to work with partners in developing alliances: Opportunities for expanding partnerships should be explored in areas related to emissions, health sciences and policy, recreation and weather derivatives. It's important to document success stories and make sure these reach a broad audience, especially in non-traditional media that reach new customers. These success stories can also be used in explaining to Congress how our community's research helps to maintain economic vitality. We also need to work closely with partners in business and public policy to design and produce prototype concepts for innovative, customized applications for a whole industry. We also need to establish stronger ties to university colleagues as well as those in business. Data and patent issues will be challenging.

(3) Human resources: An important question to consider is whether the current academic infrastructure is adequate for implementing the above recommendations.

Harriss also made the following points:

- The atmospheric science community gave birth to the new field of industrial ecology. New journals were developed which helped to circulate the success stories and the lessons learned.

- Institutions make a huge difference. NSF has funded a few broad multidisciplinary projects that meet the needs of public policy.

- Timeliness of our economy. A single missed forecast--for example, a huge snowfall at an airport in Seattle--can cost a company like Fed Ex $12 M in one night.

- Construction is another industry where time is of the essence. Our community needs to talk to them about how to best deal with extreme weather.

D. Strengthening Fundamental Understanding - Guy Brasseur (Director-ACD/NCAR) and Kerry Emanuel (MIT)

The group addressed the question on why it is important for the country to have a strong fundamental research activity. Emanual said there were two primary concerns: the institutionalization of science and the diminishing quality and quantity of students. There is concern that fundamental science is being compromised by large named programs. Pressure to maintain the status quo of these large programs is strong because it is easy for science managers to sell them to Congress. Applied research has yielded some unexpected results. It's much easier to get funding, especially from NSF, for an application-driven major program. Data on the diminishing quality and quantity of students entering the atmospheric sciences is mostly anecdotal; the group expressed hope that UCAR could help find a way to get more specific and concrete data on this issue. Students who do have a strong background in physics and mathematics are not going into meteorology. There is a sense that competition for the best and brightest students is getting much tougher in all fields of science. The group asked if UCAR could help in the general recruitment of students into our discipline and also, could UCAR do a survey about meteorology graduates, tracking where they are working, for example.

General discussion about all four areas continued. There is a growing recognition that this community is relevant to the economics of the nation. For example, universities, government agencies and industries in Canada formed partnerships and developed "centers of excellence" to study the air pollution problem addressing atmospheric, health and economics issues. A network of centers of excellence would have top researchers and their own graduate students. The community is being asked for integrative tools for air quality research. Customers along both sides of the border of Mexico are seeking these tools. On these and other issues, the atmospheric sciences, business, and environmental regulators need to work together. Policy issues and patents need to be worked out; all universities are facing the issue of intellectual property.

Regarding facilities, the BASC report highlights two imperatives: making the best use of observations and developing new instrument systems and facilities. What's the optimal mix? A suggestion was to use NCAR as a model of instrumentation; perhaps UCAR could be the bridge for linking universities in one region to another. There is a lot of opportunity within NASA and NOAA to develop partnerships for instrumentation development. There should be some way that the community could partner with NSF on instrumentation development.

NSF could identify interdisciplinary areas and offer appointments across disciplines; environmental activity will reach across several disciplines and areas. If NSF receives such a proposal, more than one division should review it. Virtual centers like CCSM (the Community Climate System Model) should also be considered to develop stronger partnerships between universities and NCAR. Information technology will facilitate these types of collaborations like never before.

14. UNSTRUCTURED DISCUSSION

Rich Clark (Millersville U) gave a report on the Academic Affiliates meeting. Their main agenda item was instrument technology development and their view that funds for this should be additional and not be taken from regular funding. The Academic Affiliates, which were added in 1991, have gone through a maturation process and are looking at how they can better interact and affect change within the UCAR community since they represent a significant component of the atmospheric science community.

Anthes, on behalf of Bob Roesch (UCAR Human Resources Director), thanked the universities who have participated in the annual salary survey and urged those universities who have not yet completed their surveys, to please do so. The statistics are very useful not only for UCAR but also to those universities who participate in the survey.

Fisk announced that this is Robert Roper's (Georgia Institute of Technology) last Members' meeting since he is retiring soon. Fisk thanked Roper for his thoughtful and wise participation, and the model he presented in discussions by always taking the high road in a constructive fashion. Roper stated that consensus can be built better at these meetings than with any other group within the community.

15. ADJOURN

The meeting adjourned at 2:45pm.

~ End of Minutes ~