The GeoPRISMS Steering and Oversight Committee (GSOC) comprised 11-15 members who represented the broad GeoPRISMS community. Each member served three-year terms, on average. The GSOC was overseeing by the GeoPRISMS Chair. The committee met once a year, at the NSF Headquarters in the spring, to help guide program activities.
Committee members in 2020. From top to bottom, left to right: Demian Saffer (GeoPRISMS Chair), Becky Bell, Rebecca Bendick, Danny Brothers, Mark Caddick, Chad Deering, Robert Harris, Luc Lavier, Emily Roland, Kyle Straub, Jessica Warren
GSOC members were actively promoting GeoPRISMS in their respective community and were encouraged to recognize the need for, and themes of, workshops and/or theoretical institutes, working with their community to prepare the necessary proposals.
- GSOC’s activities included reviewing progress toward scientific goals, organizing and running workshops, preparing white papers and initiative summaries, promoting national and international collaborations and opportunities, fostering communication within the broader community, and providing advice and feedback to NSF program managers and GeoPRISMS chairs.
- GSOC monitored and reviewed progress towards the stated goals within each initiative’s science plan, and encouraged attempts to integrate and synthesize results. The GSOC included when possible one or more members to represent the perspectives of industry, the climate and geohazards community, and state or national surveys.
Every semester two members were usually rotating off the committee. Nomination to the committee was done either via self-nomination, nominations from the community following a “Call for Nominations” advertisement distributed by the GeoPRISMS Office, or recommendations made by retiring committee members. Adopted from GeoPRISMS predecessor program MARGINS, GSOC members were recruited so that membership remained balanced, dynamic, and unbiased: 1) Once a person has served on the steering committee, they cannot re-serve (unless they are being considered for the steering committee chair), and 2) There cannot be institutional duplication by committee members. Expertise on the committee is arranged to cover the generalities of each of the initiatives and focus sites, if at all possible.
GeoPRISMS Education Advisory Committee
The GeoPRISMS Education Advisory Committee (GEAC) provided advice and guidance on educational and outreach programs coordinated by GeoPRISMS. GEAC helped guide the development of the mini-lessons and webinars (partly supported through a separate DUE grant to Rice University).