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Unidata Summer Workshop - 2000
Shaping the Future: Unidata Users as Leaders
Ben Domenico, Principal Investigator
UCAR Proposal #2000-084
A Proposal to the National Science Foundation
January, 2000
Introduction
The Unidata Program Center (UPC) provides software and services to qualified educational and scientific research institutions for the acquisition and use of atmospheric and related geophysical data. Member institutions provide their own computers, network connections, human resources, and other infrastructure required for participation.
Since the inception of Unidata in 1985, over 200 colleges and universities have become participants in the Unidata community by becoming software users, data relay sites, and in some cases, developers of software tools that are used by the community at-large. Several hundred other institutions have benefited from infrastructure tools such as the LDM, netCDF software, and weather information distributed via the World Wide Web. Over the years, these facilities have had a positive impact on literally tens of thousands of students at the participating universities.
Unidata has worked hard at building an active community whose participation in the program transcends the receipt of free data, software, support and training. In fact, many of Unidata's participants have employed its tools in ways that could benefit others in the educational community by extending the influence into the K-12 and informal public education sect.
One of the responsibilities of the Unidata Users committee, one of several Unidata advisory groups, is to foster the exchange of ideas within the community. As part of that effort, the Committee organizes workshops that bring together the community to exchange information and ideas on how best to use Unidata resources in teaching and research. Unidata also works closely with the Cooperative Program for Operational Meteorology, Education and Training (COMET) and the Program for Advancement of Geoscience Education (PAGE) to achieve these goals, and thus the workshops are often a collaborative effort between Unidata, COMET and PAGE.
The next Unidata workshop is being planned for the week of June 19-23, 2000. Entitled "Shaping the Future, Unidata Users as Leaders", this workshop is designed to allow its participants to learn more about how others are making the most of state-of-the-art educational and research tools from Unidata and COMET. Participants whose use of these products exemplifies "best practices" within the community, will lead the workshop sessions.
Workshop Goals
The workshop is designed to showcase and expand the use of Unidata applications and resources for educational and research purposes. Participants will lead interactive sessions highlighting the use of Unidata systems to implement current pedagogical techniques. A significant portion of the workshop will be devoted to hands-on sessions in which participants can interact with the experts in lab sessions, working together to fit the tools to their own needs.
The Committee is recruiting Unidata community members, whose use of Unidata products represents the highest level of skill and innovation, to act as workshop session leaders. Their work will generally fall into one or more of these four goal categories.
Experts in teaching and research will present examples of how they use Unidata applications and data in undergraduate and graduate level courses, including introductory courses, atmospheric physics, dynamics, global-scale processes, and physical meteorology courses. These best practices will show not only how specific processes are taught or studied, but how Unidata resources can be used to implement current pedagogical practices.
Working with community members, the Unidata Program Center has developed numerous highly creative computer-based applications (MetApps). These take advantage of the latest in computer technology and allow complex physical processes to be presented and studied in innovative ways. Many community members may be unaware of these developments and will have an opportunity to learn about them. Examples include the use of VisAD as a tool for interactively presenting physical data and processes, three-dimensional, animated displays of observed and model output data, interactive thermodynamic diagrams and hodographs, and interactive weather maps.
The number and types of atmospheric simulation models has increased rapidly, making the use of the data from the models an ever-increasing challenge for the teacher or researcher. Experts in these models and their use will be on hand to demonstrate how best to use the new model output in education as well as research.
Some community participants are currently employing "best practices", MetApps or semi-operational model data in their teaching or research, and do so within the context of case studies of interesting historical weather events. Selected examples of case studies will be presented at the workshop. The COMET program and its CODIAC system represent excellent examples of the development of case studies and their use in education.
Tentative Program Outline
With the experience of past workshops and objectives of the current one, the workshop organizers feel that the most effective way to accomplish the goals is to combine formal plenary presentations with numerous smaller lab sessions.
Day 1 Presentations by keynote speakers in instructional technology and research. This will provide attendees with a broad overview of the workshop goals and objectives.
Presentations on best practices in Unidata applications
Interactive Lab sessions on Unidata applications
Day 2 Keynote speaker on instructional technology of the future
Presentations on new NWP applications
Interactive Lab sessions on Unidata and NWP applications
Panel discussions on innovative teaching methods
Day 3 Presentations of case studies using Unidata applications
Interactive Lab sessions on Unidata, NWP and MetApps applications
Day 4 Keynote speaker on new analysis and display applications - VisAD
Presentations of new software tools - MetApps
Interactive Lab sessions on Unidata, NWP and MetApps applications
Day 5 Summary sessions
Workshop Program Committee and Planning Group
The Workshop Program Committee will be composed of the Unidata Users Committee and representatives from Unidata and COMET. The workshop is being co-chaired by Anthony Rockwood of Metropolitan State College of Denver and Doug Yarger of Iowa State University.
More detail about the planning committee members can be found at:
http://216.150.6.133/unidata/contact.html
Workshop location and Logistics
The workshop will be held at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, Foothills Laboratory in Boulder, Colorado. This location provides easy access to the COMET classroom facilities and Unidata. The available computer equipment will enhance the educational experience for the attendees by providing some hands-on experience with the available systems and software.
This workshop is scheduled to follow a one-week COMET course on hydrometeorology for approximately 18 university faculty. The proposed workshop will be held for a larger audience of about 85 people and would provide a forum for learning and discussing various techniques for employing Unidata tools in research and education.
Participants and Budget Guidelines
Approximately 80 people are anticipated to attend this workshop. Lodging is available on the University of Colorado campus. Participants will pay a small registration fee to hold their space and to cover discretionary costs. All other expenses will be paid except airfare to and from Boulder, Colorado. Expenses for speakers and committee members will be paid in full. The National Weather Service, through the COMET Program at UCAR, will provide co-sponsorship in the amount of approximately $ 26,000.
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