Overview
Meals: Dining Room
Breakfast 7:30a – Lunch 12:00 – Dinner 6:00p
Food is generally served during the first 30 minutes of time designated on agenda.
Sunday, May 5
Participants arrive by car, train and plane. The group will congregate at the LAX Courtyard Marriot hotel. Gathering place for participants to relax and socialize while waiting for the shuttle to a boat that will take you to Catalina Island.
12:30 Boat option 1: Catalina Express Ferry (cost $37.25)
3:00 Boat option 2: USC Miss Christi Ferry (free)
Southern California Marine Institute, 820 South Seaside Avenue, Terminal Island, CA 90731
4:30 Arrival and room check-in
5:15 Welcome – Boone Center Courtyard
5:30 Dinner Dining Hall
6:30 Scholar and Mentor 1 minute introductions – Chris Olex
In one minute or less, each Scholar and Mentor will introduce themselves
7:30 Evening Session: Meet and Greet; Brainstorm Scholar Discussion Topics (Chris Olex)
This session will round out the day with a few ice breakers to get the group going after a day of travel. We will also introduce the topics of interest of scholars to discuss later in the week.
Monday, May 6
7:30 Breakfast
8:30 Plenary – Dr. Steven Lamy – Arctic Politics: National vs. Global Interests
The Arctic is not a global commons but a shared resource area and issues of sovereignty and domestic politics always shape policy in that region. The science tells us that we must act multilaterally on climate change and the geopolitics of the region tell a different story.
10:00 Coffee Break
10:30 Scholar Presentations – Session 1 – Lecture Hall
Each scholar will provide a brief (6 minutes or less) overview of his/her dissertation or current research. Each scholar will be critiqued by one mentor and one peer, and provide feedback to at least one peer. Critique assignments and feedback forms will be provided as handouts.
| 1. Christian Andresen – Changes in Arctic Hydrology: Implications for Climatic Feedbacks |
| 2. Joy Buongiorno – Bioinformatics reveal microbial drivers of element cycling and their response to burial within fjord sediments of Svalbard (79°N) |
| 3. Mattias Cape – |
| 4. Casey Clark – Biogeochemical tracers of change in Pacific walruses past and present |
| 5. Alice DuVivier – Using coupled models to understand the Polar regions in the past, present, and future |
| 6. Emily Eidam – Sedimentary records of dynamic landscapes in glacial fjords |
| 7. Sarah Evans – The Hydrogeology of Cold Regions in a Warming World |
12:00 Lunch
1:00 Scholar Presentations – Session 2 – Lecture Hall
| 8. Louise Farquharson – Permafrost degradation along a latitudinal transect: observations from long-term monitoring sites in Alaska and the Canadian High-Arctic |
| 9. Denis Felikson – Greenland outlet glacier shape impacts timing and magnitude of sea-level rise |
| 10. Natalie Freeman – Physical and biogeochemical features of the Southern Ocean: Their variability and change over the recent past and coming century |
| 11. Erik Gjesfjeld– Adapting to Extremes: Networking Strategies of Ancient Communities in the Kuril Islands, Northeast Asia |
| 12. Joseph Graly – Chemical Weathering Under East Antarctica |
| 13. Dulcinea Groff – Marine-terrestrial linkages in the Falkland Islands & Antarctic Peninsula |
| 14. Ruth Heindel – Cold and dusty: consequences of aeolian processes in polar ecosystems |
2:30 Waterfront orientation
3:00 Coffee Break
3:30 Scholar Presentations – Session 3 – Lecture Hall
| 15. Alia Khan – Dissolved and Refractory Black Carbon in snow, lakes and streams of the global cryosphere. |
| 16. Shannon Klotsko – Deglacial stratigraphy of Beaufort Margin sediments, Arctic Ocean |
| 17. Yekaterina (Katia) Kontar – Advancing Arctic Resilience through Science Diplomacy |
| 18. Melina Kourantidou – Arctic Marine Resource Governance: From invasive species to fisheries management |
| 19. Gunter Leguy – Improving ice sheet representation in climate models. |
4:30 Team Skills: The Myers Briggs Type Indicator™ (MBTI) (Chris Olex)
This session will be an overview of the MBTI personality preference tool and how it can help us understand ourselves and others — what makes us and others “tick” with a focus on the type characteristics and how individuals of the various types get their energy, make decisions, and respond under stress, especially in team settings.
6:00 Dinner
7:00 Plenary: Overview of NSF Organization, specific program information and general advice for proposal writing. Panel members include Lisa Rom, Chris Fritsen, Cynthia Suchman, and Colleen Strawhacker.
Representatives from NSF will provide a brief overview of Polar-specific program information, general grant-writing and communication skills.
Tuesday, May 7
7:30 Breakfast
8:00 Announcements and Plus/Delta Evaluations – Lecture Hall
8:30 Scholar Presentations – Session 3 – Lecture Hall
| 20. Michael MacFerrin – Rapid Expansion of Greenland’s Low-Permeability Ice Slabs |
| 21. Alexander Michaud – Glacial influences on microbial life. |
| 22. Samiah Moustafa – Model-Observed Runoff along the West Greenland Ice Sheet |
| 23. Vishnu Nandan – Diminishing Arctic Sea Ice: Monitoring Challenges using Radar Remote Sensing |
| 24. Isabel Nias – Modeling the Amundsen Sea ice streams, West Antarctica |
| 25. Josephine Rapp – The potential role of viruses for microbial survivability in cryospheric habitats |
| 26. Soroush Rezvanbehbahani – Basal thermal state of the Greenland Ice Sheet |
10:00 Break
10:30 Scholar Presentations – Session 4 – Lecture Hall
| 27. Heidi Smith – Linking phylogeny to function in cold temperature environments |
| 28. Laura Stevens – Influence of meltwater on Greenland Ice Sheet dynamics |
| 29. Sergio Vargas Zesati – Fusing Remote Sensing, Ecoinformatics and Cyberinfrastructure to Help Better Understand On-Going Multiscale Arctic Ecosystem Transitions |
| 30. Simone Whitecloud – Life in the Army |
| 31. Dominic Winski – Polar and Alpine Ice Core Records of Holocene Climate Change |
| 32. Gifford Wong – Injecting More of The West Wing in a Surprisingly VEEP City. |
| 33. Pat Wongpan – Using Under-ice Light Transmission to Estimate Land-fast Ice Algal Biomass in Antarctica and Saroma Lagoon, Japan |
12:00 Lunch
1:00 Teambuilding and Group Dynamics– Christina Olex
This session will discuss and practice teamwork. Scholars will work on an activity that highlights the need for details and big picture connections, good listening and sharing skills, and also understanding that we need to be patient and work hard to understand when someone is coming from a different perspective or background. The activity will be debriefed around what contributes to team success, what are barriers to it, and how group dynamics need to be monitored along the way.
2:00 Cross-disciplinary perspectives – Drs. Colleen Strawhacker (NSF) and Catherine Walker (NASA)
There are increasing amounts of opportunities at NSF to support projects that address multidisciplinary and convergent science questions. This discussion with introduce some of those opportunities, as well as provide some insight into how to create a strong project for these grant competitions. Some of these competitions, especially for those operating in the Arctic, seek approaches that include the co-production of knowledge with local and Indigenous communities, which will also be discussed here. There are also opportunities (and strategies) for other funding agencies that should be considered.
3:00 Break
3:30 Mentor Lightning Career Talks
Each mentor will provide a brief (6 minutes maximum) presentation on the arc of his or her career, with the examples here showing the different ways an interdisciplinary, societally relevant polar research career may develop. We hope this will provide a starting point for individual interactions between the scholars and with the mentors in the context of interdisciplinary research and professional development.
| 1. Christian Fritsen – Program Director, NSF Antarctic Organisms and Ecosystems Program in the Office of Polar Programs. |
| 2. Karla Heidelberg – Professor of Biological Science Teaching and Director, Environmental Studies Program, University of Southern California |
| 3. Steven Lamy – Professor, School of Int. Relations, Director, Global Policy Inst. University of Southern California |
| 4. Allen Pope – Executive Secretary, IASC Research Scientist, National Snow and Ice Data Center, Boulder, CO |
| 5. Elizabeth (Lisa) Rom – Program Director, NSF Polar Special Initiatives and Ocean Education |
4:30 Facilitation and Feedback – Chris Olex
This session will introduce concepts and tools that will be helpful for communication and feedback in group work this week and for overall professional development. Topics include:
– What is necessary to lead a group and be a valued contributor and what is challenging
– Tools – Plus/Delta, Parking Lot, Brainstorming/Funneling/Voting, Stages of Teams, Meeting tips, Group Roles
– Tips for giving and receiving feedback; why feedback can be difficult on both sides; how can we do it better
6:00 Dinner
7:00 Mentor Lightning Career Talks.
| 6. John Spear – Professor, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Colorado School of Mines |
| 7. Colleen Strawhacker – Associate Program Director, NSF Arctic System Sciences and Arctic Social Sciences and on leave from the National Snow and Ice Data Center at the University of Colorado Boulder |
| 8. Cynthia Suchman – Program Director, Arctic Natural Sciences, NSFOffice of Polar Programs |
| 9. Catherine Walker – Assistant Scientist at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in the Department of Applied Ocean Physics and Engineering, and Assistant Research Scientist at the University of Maryland Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center/NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in the Cryospheric Sciences Lab. |
| 10. Sue Weiler – Senior Research Scientist, Whitman College |
Wednesday, May 8
7:30 Breakfast
8:00 Announcements and Plus/Delta Evaluations – Lecture Hall
8:30 Leadership Impact – Chris Olex
Regardless of where you are in your career right now, there will be a point when you’ll be handed a leadership role and your team will expect you to hit the ground running. Becoming an effective leader requires finesse and complex knowledge. In this session, we will explore what good leadership looks like. We will question what really matters to people at work, how people develop the skills to do better, and what makes it difficult to ‘recover’ once we have made some mistakes. Half of the session will be in the larger group and the other half will be small groups conversations with scholars and mentors.
10:00 Coffee Break
10:30 Plenary: The Imperative of Interdisciplinary Science in the Arctic – Dr. Steven Lamy
Good public policy in this region must embrace the sciences but it must also consider the competing frames or narratives that motivate all political actors.
12:00 Lunch
1:00 Communication Activity (A. Pope)
Communication skills are important for any role in the sciences, whether you are communicating with your peers, policymakers, or the “general public.” In these two sessions we will focus on listening as the basis for communication and explore some improv-based exercises.
1:30 Challenges and Opportunities for International Polar Science – (A. Pope and J. Sohm)
The polar regions are inherently international spaces in which teams of scientists are asking globally-relevant questions. In this session, the presenters will talk about some of their international experiences (from fieldwork to research priorities to policymaking), leaving time for questions at the end.
2:30 Overview and signup for Wednesday morning activities – (Karla Heidelberg)
You will hear an overview of the options for Thursday morning optional activities and then have an opportunity to sign up for preferences. All activities are included as part of the leadership symposium.
3:00 Break
3:30 Professional Promotion Strategies (Interviews, negotiations and professional development)
Getting a promotion takes more than just doing your job well. To move up the ladder to the next step if your career, you have to prove to decision makers and leadership that you are ready and deserving enough to take on more responsibility. This takes professional consistency, successful research programs, goal-driven behavior and much more. We will start this session with facilitated breakout sessions then come back together for a group discussion (possibly J. Spear and C. Walker)
5:00 The challenge: Fostering diversity, equality and inclusivity in Polar Research (Panel)
Being inclusive is easier than you might think. We will talk about proactive proven strategies and challenges in the Polar Sciences.
6:00 Dinner
7:00 Career Panel, including pursuits outside the Ivory Towers – Location Boone Center
Allen Pope, Cynthia Suchman, and others will lead a Q&A/Discussion. We hope other mentors and any scholars in permanent positions will also share their experience and insights. This panel will also discuss opportunities outside the ivory tower.
Thursday, May 9
7:30 Breakfast
8:00 Optional waterfront activities (snorkel/kayaking) or island field trip
12:00 Lunch
1:00 Winning the Science But Loosing the Narrative – Lance Ignon – Lecture Hall
This presentation will look at the art and science of communicating climate science to a lay audience. Hint: The facts are the least important part of the story.
2:00 Breakout activity – Winning the Science But Losing the Narrative: Creation of the One Pager. Karla Heidelberg and Lance Ignon
Scholars will be asked to craft a 1-pager using templates and examples about their science themes that could be used to help engage the non-scientist about the value of their science. One pagers will be printed off and posted. Scholars feedback will be solicited and added via sticky notes.
3:00 Break
3:30 Plenary: Remote Sensing of Ice on Earth and in Space: Dynamics at a glacial pace (it’s faster than you thought!) – Dr. Catherine Walker
“At a glacial pace” is commonly used to describe things or people that take extreme amounts of time to do small tasks. In reality, however, the dynamics of ice are incredibly complex and some of the processes that have the largest or most catastrophic effects occur quickly, especially in regions where the ice interacts with ocean water. Studying these ice-ocean interactions using both remote sensing techniques and field work inform on the dynamics of ice-ocean worlds such as Europa and Enceladus (moons of Jupiter and Saturn, respectively). This presentation will summarize methods used to observe the terrestrial cryosphere and changes in ice dynamics there, and then extend that to what remote observations we can use to better understand data return from outer planetary missions. What processes occur at similar (or different) scales? How do different subsurface processes affect the observable surface/near-surface? In order to prepare for the upcoming icy moon missions by ESA and NASA, it is important to understand first how we observe these processes on Earth.
4:30 One Pager reviews from earlier session
5:00 Communication Training – Dr. Allen Pope
6:00 Dinner
7:00 Scholar Choice Breakout sessions and report back
Friday, May 10
7:30 Breakfast
8:00 Announcements and Plus/Delta Evaluations – Lecture Hall
8:30 Plenary: Life, S and Ice @ 82N 82W: Lessons on Strategies for Solid Field Science – Dr. John Spear
Borup Fiord Pass Glacier on top of Ellesmere Island, Nunavut, Canada, is the closest terrestrial analog for sulfur on ice that mimics Jupiter’s moon Europa. In work that has spanned 15 years and a few field trips to The North, I will present insights on both the science and the challenges of working with natural field systems with all kinds of collaborators.
10:00 Coffee Break
10:30 Participants Choice
12:00 Lunch
1:00 Climate Change Communication as my Professional (and Moral) Compass – Dr. Lori Ziolkowski
A few years ago, I sat where you sit now. I was a new junior faculty member getting settled on the tenure track. Typical academic metrics of success were my focus. If you had pressed me about my career goals, I would have that I wanted to constrain future carbon feedbacks in the Arctic. But then November of 2016 happened. In this talk, I will share my cathartic journey of how reshaping my career goals has led to a more fulfilling career of hope and purpose.
2:00 The challenge of polar science logistics (Walker and Sauthoff)
3:00 Break
3:30 Strategies for effective Broader Impacts – Lisa Rom and Karla Heidelberg
Great Broader impacts will not get an NSF proposal funded alone, but poorly contrived Broader Impacts can keep a proposal from being successful. In this session we will review great an innovative examples and strategies
4:30 Catch up and symposium debrief
We ask that all scholars complete a written evaluation. After the written evaluations are turned in, we will have a group discussion on positive aspects and suggestions for improvement of future symposia.
6:00 BBQ Cookout, Oral Debrief and Farewell reception
Saturday, May 11
7:30 Breakfast
8:00 Farewell remarks – Boone Center Courtyard
9:30 USC Boat departs
Ferry assignments will be posted on May 8.
Please notify one of the organizers if you are booked for the Miss Christi but intend to purchase your own ticket for one of the later Catalina Express ferries.
Note that the Catalina Express ferries can fill up.
