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Director's NoteTom Achtor |
My apologies up front for the brevity of this edition. It seems the directors are off in several directions, most of them busy working (except me :>). 30 June is the end of the Wisconsin state fiscal year, which means many on the 3rd floor are very busy wrapping up the accounting for the entire year. In addition the old CIMSS Cooperative Agreement (CA - the funding vehicle we use to bring NOAA funding here) must be closed out. The ending CIMSS CA spanned 5½ years and funded over 75 separate grants. Closing the books on that CA was also a very big job that Wenhua, Jenny and Soniya have been working on for several months.
Meanwhile Debbie has been busy helping get proposals submitted to the new (and current) CIMSS Cooperative Agreement that takes us into the future. In the past three months, after NOAA’s funding picture was better known, we submitted 25 separate proposals through the CIMSS CA, with budgets from $10K to over $4M!
The CIMSS Board of Director’s met in late June to review our successfully re-competed Institute’s goals and programs. The CIMSS Board is comprised of members from NOAA, NASA and the University, and is chaired by Martin Cadwallader, Dean of the Graduate School. Also present was Wendy Crone, our new Associate Dean for the Physical Sciences. Key points for discussion were NASA’s future Earth Science research opportunities (expanding) and the successes and concerns with NOAA’s GOES-R and JPSS programs, respectively. A comprehensive Board of Director’s Report on all CIMSS research is available online - take a look.
The annual Summer Workshop in Earth and Atmospheric Science was held the last week of June for high school students interested in science. Once again, volunteers from the Center were many: leading discussions, demonstrating and forecasting with McIDAS-V, leading tours, and providing overall support to ensure the Workshop is an enjoyable and educational event.
Enjoy your July and August, summer passes quickly.
