 | | National Oceanographic Partnership Program Presents Awards for Excellence in Partnering (News Release 12/5/01) On December 4th, the National Oceanographic Partnership Program (NOPP) presented two projects with its first annual NOPP Award for Excellence in Partnering. The ceremony took place at the semi-annual meeting of the National Ocean Research Leadership Council (NORLC), the governing council of NOPP, held in Washington, DC. The first award went to The Bridge: Online Ocean Sciences Teacher Resource Center, a novel web-based resource center that provides teachers with comprehensive information on the oceans. The second award went to the South Atlantic Bight Synoptic Offshore Observational Network (SABSOON) a research project that uses Navy “Top Gun” training towers as platforms to provide real-time coastal ocean data.
Jim Yoder, Chair of the NOPP Interagency Working Group, stated, “Our goal is to recognize those organizations within the oceanographic community who strive to create and maintain true partnerships. The Bridge and SABSOON exemplify the spirit and potential of partnering under NOPP.”
NOPP is an innovative program that was established by the U.S. Congress in 1996 to assure national security, advance economic development, protect quality of life, and strengthen science education and communication through improved knowledge of the ocean. As a collaboration of 14 federal agencies, NOPP coordinates and strengthens oceanographic efforts by identifying and funding partnerships among academia, government, industry, and other members of the ocean sciences community. For more information on the program visit www.nopp.org.
The NOPP Award for Excellence in Partnering identifies a successful NOPP effort to the ocean sciences community and provides recognition for the partnership efforts that contributed to its success. Award recipients are selected based on the degree of and commitment to partnering, project success, and impact on the ocean research community. The criteria for evaluating the partnerships include partner diversity, level of effort and involvement, matching contributions; long-term commitment beyond the NOPP-funding period; success in meeting its project objectives; and impact of the effort on the ocean research community.
Frances Lee Larkin and Vicki P. Clark, representing the National Sea Grant Educators Network, the National Marine Educators Association, and Virginia Institute of Marine Science at the College of William and Mary, accepted the award on behalf of The Bridge. The Bridge, a web-based resource center and clearinghouse, brings together marine educators, academia, private industry, and government to provide educators with a comprehensive source of accurate and useful information on global, national and regional marine science topics. The Bridge is unique among education portal sites in its focus on ocean sciences, its close ties to both the education and the research communities, and its success in making online data easy for educators to use. The Bridge’s primary target audience is high school and middle school science teachers. Currently, The Bridge hosts more than 2000 visits each week. For more information, visit: http://www.marine-ed.org/bridge.
Accepting the award on behalf of SABSOON was Harvey Seim, University of North Carolina; Charlie Barans, SC Department of Natural Resources; Reed Bohne, Gray’s Reef National Marine Sanctuary, NOAA; Jud Gatch, Naval Surface Warfare Center (NSWC); and Jim Nelson, Skidaway Institute of Oceanography. Other SABSOON project partners are the University of Georgia and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in Athens, Georgia. SABSOON is an interdisciplinary coastal ocean observing network that will provide users with continuous, real-time information on coastal ocean conditions in the South Atlantic Bight (SAB). Observations from the network are used to improve regional marine weather predictions, and provide real-time coastal ocean data for resource managers. Academic researchers are using the network for targeted research and as a test bed for sensor development. SABSOON is intended to be a flexible facility that can host a variety of scientific, educational and environmental monitoring activities. Unique aspects of the facility include potential coverage of more than 5,000 square km of the coastal ocean, ease of instrument servicing, ability to accommodate sophisticated instrumentation and relatively high bandwidth. Recent observations are made available through the project web site: www.skio.peachnet.edu/projects/sabsoon.html.
Representatives of The Bridge and SABSOON were each presented with a crystal award in the shape of a water droplet and engraved with the project name and the year it was honored. On hand at the NORLC meeting to congratulate the awardees were Susan Morrisey Livingstone, Under Secretary of the Navy, Rita Colwell, Director of the National Science Foundation (NSF), and Scott Gudes, Acting Administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
The Consortium for Oceanographic Research and Education serves as the Program Office for NOPP. Based in Washington, D.C., CORE represents 67 of the U.S. oceanographic research institutions, universities, laboratories and aquaria. As the centralized voice for these institutions, CORE conducts a wide range of educational, research, and public policy activities and works to promote, develop and support efforts to advance knowledge and learning in the science of oceanography. For more information visit www.COREocean.org.
To view pictures from the award ceremony, click here.
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