EAGER: Democratizing the use of Advanced Computational Resources

先进的网络基础设施在几乎所有领域和学科的研究中正变得越来越重要。然而，许多领域和学科的研究人员不知道有什么可用，也不知道如何与网络基础设施打交道。此外，大学和学院之间长期存在的数字鸿沟限制了对网络基础设施的获取，以及充分利用先进网络基础设施能力所需的专业知识。环境还要求网络基础设施专业人员和机构不断学习和能力建设。这有可能进一步加剧我们国家正在经历的“数字鸿沟”。除非我们能够找到方法，更有效地向来自小型学院和服务不足的机构的更大的“非专家用户”群体提供访问、培训、教育和援助，否则数字鸿沟将持续存在并将继续扩大。这个急切的项目将通过在四个一般领域进行一系列多个焦点小组访谈来解决这些差距，并将产生一项需求评估，为各国在研究网络基础设施方面的投资提供信息。第一组焦点小组的目标是从学生和研究人员那里更好地了解先进计算的现状和未来潜力，这些学生和研究人员已经有动力使用计算设施，但目前还没有这样做。第二组重点小组的目标是确定使用计算资源的新应用程序，包括目前未使用先进网络基础设施能力的非传统方法和研究领域。第三组重点小组的目标是确定吸引远程或服务不足的高级计算资源潜在用户参与的机制，并更好地了解他们获取和使用这些资源的障碍。第四组重点小组的目标是探讨服务不足的机构和规模较小的校园在使用先进的网络基础设施资源方面面临的机遇和挑战。这将包括重点确定机构支持的障碍，包括考虑到当前的混乱造成的额外压力，校园领导人和管理人员面临的挑战。这一奖项反映了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。

Advanced cyberinfrastructure is becoming increasingly central to research across virtually all fields and disciplines. Yet, researchers in many fields and disciplines do not know what is available or how to engage with the cyberinfrastructure. Further, longstanding digital divides across universities and colleges limit access to cyberinfrastructure and the needed expertise to fully utilize advanced cyberinfrastructure capabilities. The environment also requires continuous learning and capacity building on the part of cyberinfrastructure professionals and institutions. This threatens to further exacerbate the "digital divide" our nation is experiencing. Unless we can find ways to more effectively provide access, training, education, and assistance to the much larger group of "non-expert users" from small colleges and underserved institutions, the digital divide will persist and will continue to expand. This EAGER project will address these gaps through a series of multiple focus group interviews in four general areas and will generate a needs assessment that can inform national investments in the research cyberinfrastructure. The goal of the first set of focus groups is to better understand the present state and future potential of advanced computing from students and researchers who are already motivated to use compute facilities but are not doing so currently. The goal of the second set of focus groups is to identify new applications that use compute resources including non-traditional approaches and research domains that currently do not use advanced cyberinfrastructure capabilities. The goal of the third set of focus groups is to identify mechanisms for engaging remote or underserved potential users of advanced computing resources and to better understand the barriers to their access and use of these resources. The goal of the fourth set of focus groups is to explore the opportunities and challenges under-served institutions and smaller campuses face in using advanced cyberinfrastructure resources. This will include a focus on identifying barriers to institutional support, including challenges facing campus leaders and administrators given additional pressures caused by the current pandemic.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.