Participant Checklist

What to do in preparation for the workshop for Early Career Faculty in the Geosciences

To help you get the most out of the workshop for Early Career Faculty in the Geosciences, we ask that you do several things in advance. Here's a list of those preparatory activities and their deadlines:

Prior to the workshop:

  • Review the materials in the "Before the Workshop" section of the Workshop Program
  • Create a SERC account, if you do not yet have one. You can do so by filling out the form on the right side of this account page. Please note that your access to private workshop webspaces is tied to the email address associated with your SERC account, so please use the same email you had registered with or contact Carol Ormand (cormand AT carleton DOT edu) if you need to make adjustments.
  • Optional: If you know of a good resource for early career faculty in the geosciences, please suggest a book for our virtual bookshelf.
  • Optional: Share your wisdom with your colleagues. Based on your experience, what advice do you have for other early career faculty members about time management or work-life balance, or for graduate students and post-docs about the academic job search process?
  • If you are going to NSF, keep reading... Otherwise, that's it.

Preparing for Your Visit to NSF

We suggest that you do the following before the workshop:

  • Prepare a two-page bio/resume (NSF style bio sketch instructions can be found here, under section F)
  • Review the NSF visit schedule and think about which sessions you most want to attend when there are concurrent sessions.
  • Think about your questions and bring them with your ideas and your energy. Spending time with NSF staff is always a mind-expanding experience (and a lot of fun, especially if you are well-prepared!). The program directors are top-notch scholars with their fingers on the pulse of the action in their respective fields. Meeting them is a great learning opportunity and can help you to clarify your research plans and figure out your next steps. It is their job to meet with members of the scientific community and they enjoy their work. We strongly encourage everyone to sign up for an individual meeting with the appropriate program director. Participants who met individually with program directors during prior workshops, even participants whose ideas about a potential project were very general, found that the program directors were very helpful in providing feedback for the project.
  • Think about how you will introduce yourself to your program director in about one minute. Your introduction should include: a) name and affiliation, b) disciplinary expertise, and c) your research area or topic including why you think it is an important topic (e.g. relevance to society).
  • Be ready to speak concisely about your favorite one or two research proposal ideas. (You can give them copies of your proposal summary if you have one.) Be able to clearly state the goal or hypothesis, how this fits within your larger research direction or program, the benefits of this type of research, and how you will accomplish it.
  • Wear professional clothes.

*NAGT Membership: Accepted participants will receive a code they can use to apply to a regular NAGT membership for the 2022 calendar year ($75 value, only redeemable for NAGT membership). If the participant is already an NAGT member, they can apply the code to renew their 2023 membership for free. Through your NAGT membership, you will be part of a diverse community of geoscientists and educators who support each other by sharing their expertise, share common interests, and pursue common goals. Explore NAGT member benefits.