NEON Ambassador Program
The NEON Ambassador Program empowers and connects a cohort of researchers and educators eager to augment NEON’s engagement with diverse communities. The program is designed to help Ambassadors use NEON data and resources to accelerate scientific discovery, enhance educational opportunities, increase diversity and inclusion of the scientific community, and/or inform public policy at a continental scale.
Ambassadors are leading a new July workshop series to explore NEON derived data products!
Workshop dates in July 2023
Application deadline had closed
We are looking to bring together researchers, data scientists, and educators who are utilizing NEON data to identify and prioritize opportunities to improve the usability of NEON data. Empowering scientists and researchers to assess what is needed and what those derived data products are will help us build a better ecological future. We aim to address the community’s diverse and evolving needs and support the community in designing derived data products.
Who are the NEON Ambassadors?
NEON Ambassadors are:
- Linked by a passion to understand the environment and to address challenges that affect our society with actionable responses.
- Excited about NEON data and resources and their potential to advance discovery and education.
- Eager to grow the open science NEON user community.
- Open-minded and creative, with a drive to collaborate with and foster the NEON community to help realize its full potential for generations of scientists to come.
Current Ambassadors
Meet the first Ambassador Cohort
| Name | Affiliation | Bio |
|---|---|---|
| Kelly Aho | NEON Postdoc | link |
| Jeff Atkins | USDA Forest Service | link |
| Theresa Crimmins | USA National Phenology Network | link |
| Andrew Elmore | University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science | link |
| Jennifer Gee | University of California Riverside | link |
| Miquel Gonzalez-Meler | University of Illinois at Chicago | link |
| Catherine Hulshof | Virginia Commonwealth University | link |
| Danica Lombardozzi | National Center for Atmospheric Research | link |
| Ryan McClure | Virginia Tech | link |
| Chelsea Nagy | University of Colorado Boulder | link |
| Andrew Richardson | Northern Arizona University | link |
| Benjamin Ruddell | Northern Arizona University | - |
| Arial Shogren | University of Alabama | link |
| Jessie Walker | Arkansas Division of Higher Education | - |
What does being an “Ambassador” involve?
- Minimum 12 month engagement: NEON asks that Ambassadors engage with the program for a minimum of one year (with the opportunity to continue longer if desired).
- Regular cohort connections: attend one 1-hour virtual meeting per month to:
- Hear from other Ambassadors about ideas and/or how they have been engaging with the community
- Hear from NEON about internal news and opportunities
- Active engagement and creative collaboration:
- Attend and actively participate in working group meetings around cohort initiatives
- Promote NEON in your scientific and professional activities
- Share tools, derived products, etc. that you develop related to NEON data
- Adhere to NEON’s Code of Conduct and commitment to DEI practices
Why be a Champion for NEON?
The National Ecological Observatory…
- Is strategically poised to grow rapidly addressing the issues of our time including climate change; you will be a champion for planetary and societal health and wellbeing now and for future generations.
- Is a platform for educational resources to develop and share curriculum/lessons fostering data science in the classroom. Touches national resources vital to food, water and energy production systems that are impacted by human activity and climate change.
- Is of interest to all sectors, private, public and governmental that increasingly need empirical and actional data to manage and react to extremes in the moment of change.
- Data is freely accessible to all and aims to work towards eliminating barriers and hurdles to data access.
Benefits for Ambassadors
NEON Ambassadors can benefit from...
- A trusted network of like-minded peers: meet, interact with, and learn from people across a multitude of disciplines and expertise, promoting science, education, outreach, and policy implementation. This will predominantly take place virtually, but NEON will endeavor to explore opportunities to bring Ambassadors together in person when global events permit.
- Direct access to NEON: forge direct working relationships and points of contact with NEON staff and resources.
- Dedicated community platform: A slack channel dedicated to program offering direct access to fellow Ambassadors and NEON staff and support.
- Dedicated community GDrive and toolkit: a one-stop-shop to navigate all Ambassador resources and toolkits that will evolve with the needs of the cohort.
- Exposure to “Big Science:” experience big science operations and resulting data streams in a way that is not typically accessible. This illuminates the challenges and opportunities of the evolving NEON program at a continental scale - Ambassadors are part of this effort.
- Access resources for catalyzing wider community engagement: Take part in organizing conference / engagement activities that expose NEON to wider communities and partners; catalyze new ideas aimed at empowering more people to use NEON data (e.g., development of new tools) using NEON resources.
- Amplifying professional profiles: build recognition within the Ambassador community and beyond through NEON seminars, partnerships, web pages, and social media.
Application Process and Deadline
Applications for the current cohort have closed. Please check back for news of the next application cycle.
Questions? Please contact ambassador@battelleecology.org