The presentation slides of Day 1 at the EarthCube Test Enterprise Governance Assembly Synthesis Workshop held April 16-18 in Tucson, AZ. Slides include an overview of the week's agenda, goals, and preview of the workshop. As well as what the EarthCube team has learned thus far in terms of EarthCube Governance Functions.

1. 4/16/2014 1
Define Functions:
Short, medium and
long-term
Recap 1:
What we learned
about what EarthCube
can and needs to do.
Finalizing
Governance
Structures
Day 1
Consensus on:
Primary functions of
EarthCube Governance
Clear language defining
what exactly EarthCube is.
Day 2 Day 3
Consensus on:
Major components of
governance.
Specific design of the
leadership structure.
Consensus On:
An EarthCube Governance
System that supports the
commons including:
• It’s primary functions
• It’s primary structures
and details about how
those structures function
• How it integrates with
existing efforts
• How to gather feedback
Selecting Governance
Structures &
Incorporating
Existing Structures
Define EarthCube
Mission/Vision:
Clear, specific
statements that
explain and clarify.
Recap 2:
What governance
structures already
exist and were
envisioned
Developing
Governance
Structures
Exploring How to Vet
the Governance
Model

2. 4/16/2014 2
EarthCube Defined and Clarified

3. How we got here
4/16/2014 3

4. 4/16/2014 4
Roadmaps & Concept Designs
End-user workshops & Stakeholder Alignment
Test governance award
Building blocks, RCNs, and conceptual design awards
The EarthCube journey
White Papers & Expressions of Interest
Charrettes

5. 4/16/2014 5
Five formalized groups with charters or guidelines
A half dozen or more workgroups with specific goals
Years of previous work to remind us what EarthCube
can achieve and could focus on
Over a hundred engaged stakeholders who have informed
the governance process
Two months until a fully developed plan will be
shared at the All Hands Meeting
Where we’re at on Governance

6. 4/16/2014 6
EarthCube isn’t a fresh slate – we’ve been working on this
for years and doing good work
We are moving too slowly – governance was needed
yesterday and it’s time to get concrete
What do you mean we’re still trying to define
EarthCube? We’ve done this 10 times before (or 30!)
We shouldn’t have jumped to assuming we need these
specific Councils and workgroups
What’s EarthCube? I don’t get it.
What we’re hearing

7. Where we are
today
4/16/2014 7

8. 4/16/2014 8
Walk out of this meeting with consensus on…
EarthCube – what it is, what it can be, what we can say
about it
EarthCube Governance – what is needed now and what
will need to be developed over time
Our charge

9. 4/16/2014 9
This means we need to be…

10. Who is
EarthCube?
4/16/2014 10

11. 4/16/2014
11
End User
Scientists
Cyber & Science
Infrastructure
Experts
Societal Interests
Government, including:
Elected officials
Science funding agencies
Regulatory/service agencies
Environmental resource
managers
Commercial industry
Professional associations,
NGOs, standards
organizations, & scholarly
journals
Others, such as K-12
educators, citizen scientists,
museums & archives, and
libraries
Data facilities
Cyber-infrastructure
and high performance
computing experts
Software engineers
Designers/
developers of
geoscience
instrumentation
Atmospheric and
Space Weather,
Biologists/
Ecosystem,
Climate, Critical
Zone, Computer,
Geologists,
Geophysicists,
Hydrologists,
Information,
Oceanographers,
Physical
Geographers,
Polar, Social, and
others
Size of box does NOT indicate relevance

12. End User
Feedback
4/16/2014 12

13. NSF GeoVision 2009
Fostering a sustainable future
through a better understanding
of our complex and changing
planet.

14. SCIENCE CHALLENGES

15. Scientific Grand Challenges: Central themes
• Multi-disciplinary science to further understand our
environment
– E.g. physical, chemical, and biological processes in ocean ecosystems
• Understand, adapt to, or propose changes in scientific
approach
– Understand and test hypotheses and underlying controls of current
science
– Improved prediction capabilities
• Better use of available data or new ways of
collecting/distributing data
– Chronological & Time-Series Data (distribution and analysis)
– Mutli-scale modeling – beyond increasing resolution, e.g. translation of
variables, coupling between models, uncertainties
– Acquisition, assimilation, and modeling in cross-cutting regions
(Integration of long-tail scientific data)

16. Scientific Grand Challenges: Central themes
4/16/2014 16
• Improved collaboration and coordination
among disparate funded projects/programs
and disciplines; including improving upon the
use of existing facilities and observatories
• Communication of science (& data) to society
– Improving science-based decision making in
public policy
– Workforce development & “data literacy”/”data
savviness”

17. Specific Re-occurring Science Challenges
• Better understanding of anthropogenic activities
(beyond climate change) over time
– E.g. availability of drinking water, land use (coastal
development, development in hazards zones),
transportation of invasive species
• Need for a 4D (Spatial & Temporal) Framework for
the Earth
– Multi-scale: local, regional, global
• Climate modeling & weather prediction*
• Ocean modeling & biological impacts*
*possibly a function of workshops funded

18. TECHNICAL CHALLENGES

19. TECHNICAL CHALLENGES

20. Technical Challenges: Central themes
• Search and Access
– Lack of awareness of existing tools and resources
– Need for improved tools to enhance discoverability
– Need for increased awareness of resources within and
outside of specific domains.
– Need to incorporate legacy/dark data
– Quality and formatting barriers to accessing found data
• Storage
– Lack of domain specific databases

21. Technical Challenges: Central themes
4/16/2014 21
• Tools
– Software and algorithm development need to keep pace with
research advances.
– Need for Increased visualization capabilities, simpler tools
– Lack of tools to facilitate capturing metadata and
documentation
• Sustainability
– Need support for long term archiving and retrieval
– More data producers than managers
– Need for Increased training in data use and stewardship
– Need for easier ways to move and share large data sets

22. Technical Challenges: Central themes
• Interoperability
– Inconsistent/ incomplete metadata
– Formats and archiving standards vary across projects, and
domains
– Compliance mechanisms for providing metadata at point of
acquisition
– Increased uncertainty comes w/ new sources, uncertainty
needs to be communicated
• Cultural
– Lack of incentives for sharing data. Academic culture still
very publication focused, need for better ways of
recognizing academic merit of data.
– Need for more communication between data producers and
data managers and tool builders.
– Need for different types of support for diverse users.

23. What is
EarthCube?
4/16/2014 23

24. 4/16/2014 24
Functions related to specific audiences
Guidance to NSF
on requirements
for a data
management plan
in funding
opportunities
Actively
connecting to the
many related
efforts including
ESIP and OGC.
Engagement of
stakeholders (e.g.
professional
societies,
publishers,
government,
commercial)
End user
engagement and
support, including
onboarding new
audiences to
EarthCube
Alignment of the
funded projects
(interoperability,
connections to
end users)
Software voice
and coordinating
software with
infrastructure
Professional
development for
graduate students

25. 4/16/2014 25
Issues that need attention
IT/Legal advice
associated with
end-users access
to resources
Mitigating the
barriers created
by academic
culture (e.g.
through awards/
incentives)
How to best
support data
preservation
Software
Academic/
Professional
Career Paths
Communications
– spreading the
word about
EarthCube across
academic, private
sector, and
government.
Managing
tensions between
structure and
agility
Maintaining
transparency in
decision-making
Creating
feedback loops
among different
stakeholders and
governance
structures

26. 4/16/2014 26
Other potential functions
Data quality and
standards
(leveraging what
already exists)
Funding and
sustainability
Knowledge
management
(including periodic
systemic review of
contributions to the
EC body of
knowledge)
Brokering/
facilitating cross-
disciplinary
connections
Facilitating data
reuse
Enable new areas of
research

27. Reflection: What functions are critical…
4/16/2014 27
…right now. We need them without delay.
…in the next year. We need to develop them soon.
…in the future, but they aren’t necessary
immediately.

28. EarthCube
Defined
4/16/2014 28

29. 4/16/2014 29
A community-driven process for the development of a
cyberinfrastructure framework to understand and
predict responses of the Earth as a system—from the
space-atmosphere boundary to the core, including the
influences of humans and ecosystems. EarthCube is an
environment where stakeholders can bring together
existing and new tools, models, databases, software,
and collaboration spaces to facilitate the conduct of
cross-disciplinary and interdisciplinary research to
transform the way we do science.
Definition?