Stakeholder-Guided Environmental Science

该奖项的全部或部分资金来自《2021年美国救援计划法案》(公法117-2)。这个国家科学基金会研究培训(NRT)项目在德克萨斯农工大学科珀斯克里斯蒂分校(TAMU-CC)进行，这是一家拉美裔服务机构(HSI)，将培训传统上参与STEM研究领域代表性不足的群体的学生，使他们成为能够利用数据革命(HDR)、利益相关者指导的环境科学(STAGE)的跨学科环境科学家队伍的一部分。沿海气候变化是一项巨大的挑战，需要产生可操作的新知识和解决方案，以采用趋同的方法来应对这一挑战。海岸和海洋系统科学计划(CMSS)将包括STAGE计划，并提供融合的培训经验。这一经验将把创新研究与实践者和社区需求联系起来，以回答利益相关者指导的国家关注的问题。该项目预计将在四年内培训多达四十(40)名硕士和博士生，其中包括来自TAMU-CC海岸和海洋系统科学(CMSS)计划的21(21)名资助学员。STAGES将产生新的知识：(1)从陆地-水-大气连接节点的大数据中了解驱动沿海环境系统的复杂过程，以及(2)将利益相关者和大数据整合到学术研究中，以提高学员参与汇聚研究和职业准备的方式。CMSS教员与利益相关者的长期关系将被用于可持续和可扩展的新培训模式。这一模式将共同开发适合受训团队使用机器学习(ML)方法处理的研究项目。利益攸关方包括各级政府机构、非政府组织和社区团体，其共同目标是提高墨西哥湾沿岸社区和环境的复原力。各阶段将为数据密集的汇聚环境科学提供课程基础，从每年春天的课程作业开始，并进行为期一周的实地考察，亲身体验陆地-水-大气事件的相互作用。春季晚些时候的利益相关者研讨会将学员和利益相关者配对，以制定以数据为重点的研究问题。夏季大数据闪电战让学员为团队回答问题做好准备，最终在秋季达到顶峰，以提炼和交流研究结果。受训者将受益于一支经验丰富、具有广泛领域、数据科学和学生培训经验的跨学科教研员队伍。预期的结果将包括以下方面的最佳做法：让利益攸关方确定数据密集型挑战和共同开发研究问题；具有不同背景的受训人员吸收这些挑战；确定适合受训人员不同研究领域的问题。在培训过程中，受训者将成为更好的科学传播者，能够与利益攸关方接触，并掌握他们长期合作决策的伦理层面。STEAS将建立和传播沿海和海洋系统科学方面具有变革性的STEM培训、研究和评估进展，以产生可持续和可扩展的研究生教育模式。NSF研究培训(NRT)计划旨在鼓励开发和实施大胆的、具有潜在变革意义的STEM研究生教育培训模式。该计划致力于通过创新的、基于证据的、与不断变化的劳动力和研究需求保持一致的综合实习生模式，在高度优先的跨学科或趋同研究领域对STEM研究生进行有效培训。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This award is funded in whole or in part under the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (Public Law 117-2). This National Science Foundation Research Traineeship (NRT) project at the Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi (TAMU-CC), a Hispanic-Serving Institution (HSI), will train students from groups traditionally underrepresented in their participation in STEM fields of study to be part of a diverse workforce of interdisciplinary environmental scientists capable of harnessing the data revolution (HDR) for Stakeholder-Guided Environmental Science (STAGES). Coastal climate change is a grand challenge, and there is a need to generate actionable new knowledge and solutions to address this challenge, using convergent approaches. The Coastal and Marine System Science program (CMSS) will house the STAGES program and offer a convergent training experience. This experience will connect innovative research to practitioner and community needs to answer stakeholder-guided questions of national concern. The project anticipates training up to forty (40) Master's and Ph.D. students, including twenty-one (21) funded trainees from the TAMU-CC's Coastal and Marine System Science (CMSS) program, over four years.STAGES will generate new knowledge: (1) from big data at the nexus of land-water-atmospheric connections to understand complex processes driving coastal environmental systems, and (2) regarding the integration of stakeholders and big data into academic research in ways that boost trainee involvement in convergent research and occupational readiness. CMSS faculty's long-standing relationships with stakeholders will be used for a new training model that is sustainable and scalable. This model will co-develop research projects suitable for trainee teams to tackle using Machine Learning (ML) methods. Stakeholders include government agencies on all levels, non-governmental organizations, and community groups, with a common goal to improve the resiliency of Gulf Coast communities and environment. STAGES will provide a curricular foundation for convergent environmental science that is data intensive, starting each spring with coursework and a week-long field trip to experience the interaction of land-water-atmospheric events firsthand. Late Spring Stakeholder Workshops pair trainees and stakeholders to formulate data-focused research questions. Summer Big Data Blitzes prepare trainees for team efforts to answer questions, culminating in Fall Capstones to refine and communicate research results. Trainees will benefit from an interdisciplinary cadre of deeply experienced faculty researchers with extensive field, data science, and student training experience. Anticipated findings are expected to include best practices for engaging stakeholders to identify data-intensive challenges and co-develop research questions; assimilation of the challenges by trainees with various backgrounds; and identification of problems appropriate for the trainees' different fields of study. During the training process, trainees will become better science communicators who can engage stakeholders and grasp the ethical dimensions of their decisions for long-term collaborations. STAGES will establish and disseminate transformative STEM training, research, and evaluation advances in coastal and marine system science that produce a sustainable and scalable graduate education model. The NSF Research Traineeship (NRT) Program is designed to encourage the development and implementation of bold, new potentially transformative models for STEM graduate education training. The program is dedicated to effective training of STEM graduate students in high priority interdisciplinary or convergent research areas through comprehensive traineeship models that are innovative, evidence-based, and aligned with changing workforce and research needs.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.