Dr. Eve Gruntfest SSWIM Advisory Council Norman, OK November 16, 2009 Sponsored by University of Oklahoma & The National Weather Center

Our First Years – Accomplishments Bringing you up to date Launching projects, Writing proposals, Getting the word out – SSWIM definition and action From now on - Next steps Publications, dissertations, research, new hires 2012 – beyond Longer-term prospects SSWIM identity (faculty positions?) More work between campus departments & NWC New interdisciplinary programs? Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice Outline

 Importance of social science to weather & climate research and applications recognized locally & nationally  Great strides since 3/06 Norman WAS*IS (Weather & Society * Integrated Studies)  NOAA & OU visionaries move to weave in social science 11/07  Collaboration between NOAA & OU  NOAA National Severe Storms Laboratory  OU‐NOAA Cooperative Institute for Mesoscale Meteorological Studies  OU Vice President for Research  OU College of Atmospheric & Geographic Sciences  OU Center for Spatial Analysis  Annual report submitted 6/09, update submitted 9/09 SSWIM history – launched May year initial funding Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice

Vision Collaborative research & partnerships between the social sciences & meteorology, climatology, & hydrology to enhance societal relevance of research & practice & reduce risks from atmospheric & other hazards Mission Creatively & sustainably weave social science concepts & methodologies into the fabric of weather & climate research & practice through academic & professional activities locally, nationally & globally SSWIM Social Science Woven into Meteorology Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice

SSWIM’s three goals 1. To weave social science into the activities of the National Weather Center & elsewhere – not an “add –on” 2. To build a reputation as a center of social science research & practice in weather & climate work 3. To revolutionize the research to operations equation – so it’s no longer top-down & all partners play equal roles – decision-makers, forecasters, product designers and researchers Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice

SSWIM’s objectives are innovative research & capacity building  … by increasing the appreciation of the value of qualitative as well as quantitative approaches including archival, ethnographic, & participatory methods  … through partnerships with public, private, & academic sectors, including students, practitioners, & policymakers across the spectrum of stakeholders Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice

SSWIM personnel – recruited to OU  Director Eve Gruntfest (25%)  Post-doctoral research scientist (100%)  Dr. Heather Lazrus Environmental Anthropologist 2/09  2 Ph.D. social science graduate students  Gina Eosco  Communication  (25%) 8/08  Monica Zappa  Geographer  (50% ) 8/09 Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice WAS*IS weather & society * integrated studies CULTURE CHANGE All WAS * ISers

 Applied geographer  > 30 Year career as “socio /hydro /meteor - ologist!”  Research: Flash floods & short-fuse warning systems  Inventor of the WAS * IS movement (Weather & Society * Integrated Studies) Dr. Eve Gruntfest SSWIM director Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice

 Publications  Articles published and in revision  Book proposal to Wiley Publishers – all positive reviews  Proposals  NOAA Global Systems Division - $70,000 funded  NSF Science & Technology Center - $350,000 (U. Iowa) declined  OU Stimulus funds 2 proposals declined  NOAA National Tsunami Mitigation program/StormReady evaluation - $500,000 declined  NSF - Does WRF Downscaling Improve the GEFS Ensemble? $400,000 submitted  NOAA Central Regional Team - $15,000 funded Dr. Eve Gruntfest SSWIM highlights Representing SSWIM, OU & NWC Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice

Dr. Eve Gruntfest SSWIM highlights Representing SSWIM, OU & NWC  Appointed adjunct faculty member OU Geography  Serving on graduate student committees: Randy Peppler, Rachel Butterworth, Somer Erickson  Webpage, one-pager, roadmap, strategic plan  Dozens of presentations including invited keynote speaker  Water & Society * Integrated Studies Kansas City, MO 8/09 International Flash Flood Lab San Marcos, TX 10/09  U. of N. Florida Jacksonville, FL 11/09 including talks to faculty, National Weather Service, City of Jacksonville  U. of California Davis, CA 12/09 Geography Department  Winner of American Meteorological Society Kenneth E. Spengler award 1/09 Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice

Dr. Heather Lazrus SSWIM Deputy Director Post-doctoral research associate  Dissertation - Perceptions of climate change & governance of vulnerability in Tuvalu, South Pacific  Local observations of environmental change  Cultural & historically contingent responses to climate change  Research with NOAA Fisheries  Impact of policy & environmental changes in Alaska & Pacific Northwest fisheries  Post-doctoral research  Atmospheric hazards, vulnerability, warning systems  Pacific Islands, New Zealand, Oklahoma, Alaska Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice

Dr. Heather Lazrus SSWIM highlights  American Meteorological Society Summer Policy Colloquium  Invited to Munich to help coordinate summer climate adaptation workshop  Funded proposal with Geological & Nuclear Sciences New Zealand  Invited participant in two post disaster assessments  Mt. Redoubt Alaska Volcanic Eruption, National Weather Service 2/09  Samoa Tsunami Earthquake Engineering Research Institute 11/09  Funded collaboration with M. Shafer & SCIPP on Drought-Ready communities project  National Weather Association Societal Impacts Board member Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice

Gina Eosco SSWIM graduate student  2 nd year Ph.D. student in Communication at OU  Five years experience working at American Meteorological Society  M.A in communication Cornell University  Interviewing forecasters, government officials & public(s) about their interpretations, objectives, & desired behavioral responses to the hurricane track graphic: cone of uncertainty Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice

Gina Eosco 11/09 highlights  Analyzing data from summer 2009 interviews in NC, FL, LA, & NY  Developing dissertation proposal  Manuscript submitted to Weather Climate & Society  Numerous presentations  Society for Risk Analysis 2008  Integrated warning team meetings – Kansas City, Omaha  MOLA, Climate study group, WAS * IS Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice

Monica Zappa SSWIM graduate student (paid by new funds) 1 st year Ph.D. student in Geography at OU B.S. in Meteorology M.S. in Geography University of Northern Illinois “Assessing Human Vulnerability to Hurricanes in Bluefields, Nicaragua” Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice

Monica Zappa 11/09 highlights  Interviewing 8 “partners” to learn preferences for next generation warning tools & integrating their views into workshop agenda  Developing graphics for changing Research-to-Operations dynamic Changing the paradigm of hazardous weather warnings Publics Weather Forecasters Media Emergency Managers & 1 st Responders 6 Developers Researchers Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice Temporal, spatial, & probabilistic information in weather forecasting & warning processes & decision-making

Storm Motion 11:02-11:20 11:50-12:20 11:12-11:43 11:05-11:35 11:00:11:21 10:55-11:15 11:02-11:35 11:36-12:23 11:46-12:18 11:45-12:21 11:55-12:25 11:49-12:28 11:51-12:26 11:40-12:27 11:45-12:20 12:29-12:48 12:26-12:40 12:28-12:50 12:27-12:51 12:28-12:48 12:29-12:48 Current time Warnings must follow the storm– too much confusion

N-S Space Scale E- W Time Scale 0 km 100 Km 1000 km 100 Km 1000 km 6 lead real Jan Feb 1Feb 2Feb 3 Feb 4Feb 5 First outlook issued 1 st watch issued (2pm) 2 nd watch issued (3pm) 1 st warning issued 9pm Nashville sirens sounded 13 fatalities 44 injuries Near Lafayette, TN Awareness raised among emergency managers, and other officials Hospitals, Schools, Events? 26 tornado warnings issued 8 severe storm warnings Geographic space scales: Regional, State, Local Area (Km 2 ) 10 Km Future research is needed to fill in this timeline with a more representative sample of the decisions to be made and by whom

Building SSWIM capacity: Gruntfest, Lazrus, Eosco & Zappa  Hosting SSWIM brownbags  Participating in weekly Hazardous Weather Testbed brownbags  Hosting visitors – K. Blumenfeld, I. Ruin, C. Lutoff  Taking class in visual analytics Fall 09  Presenting at Central Region Meteorologists-in- Charge meeting in Norman 12/09  Active mentoring of many excellent students contacting us from all over who want to work on social science & weather & climate – many FRIENDS of SSWIM Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice

Workshops organized & held  Led Advanced WAS * IS with Hazardous Weather Testbed Norman 9/08  Co-sponsored NexGen Warning Services Workshop Norman 12/08  Co-sponsored Consideration of Future Weather Workforce with K-20 Center Norman 12/08  Led Integrated Hazard Information Services Workshop with Hazardous Weather Testbed & Global Systems Division Boulder 10/09 Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice

Active SSWIM involvement  Work with K. Scharfenberg & J. Ferree to provide stakeholder feedback regarding new watch, warning, & advisory visual for display on weather.gov.  Reducing # of colors from 150 to five  Work with J. Ferree Changing NWS Call to Action statements for tornadoes  Work with D. Berkowitz et al Changing NWS Radar display  Analyze “customer” comments  Work with J.J. Gourley & K. Ortega Adding social science to SHAVE studies for hail and flash floods It’s not enough to talk to social scientists – research must be done to address these questions Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice

Social science being woven in  National Weather Service “training”  Updating Advanced Warning Operations course lectures  SSWIM incorporated into all NWS orientation classes  Social science graduate student as key component of planned Warn-on- Forecast effort with D. Stensrud Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice

OU Departments & Research Centers Applied Research, Risk, Spatial Analysis Social Science Woven into Meteorology (SSWIM) National Weather Center Severe Storms Lab, Storm Prediction Center Wider academic community attractive to existing, new, & visiting faculty & students Wider weather & climate community practitioners, researchers, students SSWIM Collaborate Facilitate collaborations Training component Intellectual home mentor students OU & SSWIM Disciplines Methods Research themes OU Departments, NOAA Labs & others Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice

 We are the GO TO group for social science in meteorology inside & outside of National Weather Center  We have a growing footprint in meteorology, climatology & hydrology SSWIM Summary – Proud of our accomplishments SSWIM has global identity as leader. in new movement We have a firm platform with high visibility Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice

SSWIM Next steps Developing protocol for effectively weaving in social science - SSWIM operation and budget guidelines Emphasizing publications & dissertation(s) development Funded collaboration with Hazardous Weather Testbed and Global Systems Division New Grad Research assistants Liaison with hazardous weather testbed (SSWIM $) Liaison with warn-on-forecast project (w. D. Stensrud) (new $) Liaison with flash flood group (Hong, Gourley) (new $)

Some SSWIM challenges  Getting launched involves time consuming appreciation of new cultures  and understanding of social science  Heather builds her research career & builds program with weather – climate & anthropology  many new opportunities in new field of climate adaption  Unrealistic to have part - time director Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice

Demand for SSWIM collaboration exceeds current capacity: More possibilities than SSWIM 2.0 FTE can accommodate  CI-FLOW National Severe Storms Lab project w/ Van Cooten  Hurricane simulation project w/ Warning Decision Training Branch & D. Morris  Survey of NSSL seminar preferences  New interdisciplinary Ph.D. programs in weather &/or climate  Survey of NSSL seminar preferences  New interdisciplinary Ph.D. programs in weather &/or climate  Proper program evaluation (e.g. for projects mentioned earlier on new web products, OU Political Science?) Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice

SSWIM longer term plans?  Building new OU graduate and/or undergraduate programs (WAS * IS for undergrad meteorology students?)  Relationship with WAS * IS movement?  We are new entity – forging new paths - Model ourselves like ?????  Writing major proposals – ourselves and with others  Size?  Governance? Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice

SSWIM Steering Committee John Ferree National Weather Service J.J. Gourley National Severe Storms Lab – Hydrology Kevin Kloesel Dean’s office Kristin Kuhlman CIMMS & National Severe Storms Lab Randy Peppler CIMMS Russ Schneider Storm Prediction Center Mark Shafer Southern Climate Impacts Planning Project Paul Spicer Center for Applied Social Research Aondover Tarhule OU Geography

 National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration  OU Vice President for Research  NOAA National Severe Storms Laboratory  Cooperative Institute for Mesoscale Meteorological Studies  OU College of Atmospheric and Geographic Sciences  OU Center for Spatial Analysis Thanks to SSWIM partners Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice CENTER for APPLIED SOCIAL RESEARCH “Social Science Innovations in the Public Interest” cimms

SSWIM Advisory Council D I S C U S S I O N Sponsored by University of Oklahoma & The National Weather Center Weaving Social Science into Weather and Climate Research and Practice