EOL Seminar: Making Data Matter: Using Collective Impact to Move Forward Together

Erin Robinson
Earth Science Information Partners (ESIP)

Earth science challenges are complex; often need partners beyond our home departments or institutions, many times the barriers are social and rely on data sharing as part of the collaborative process.

The Earth Science Information Partners (ESIP) has emerged as an exemplar network of communities of practice to provide a platform to resolve issues related to Earth science data and information interoperability. Over the last 19 years, it has become a diverse community of innovative science, data and information technology practitioners, which includes NCAR in its membership.

In this talk, I will introduce collective impact, a framework to tackle deeply entrenched and complex social problems (http://www.collaborationforimpact.com/collective-impact/). I will provide a background on ESIP, with a few brief case studies that focus on how the member organizations optimize collaboration through in-person meetings and virtually through collaboration spaces on the Web. I will conclude with a summary of community best practices based on our lessons learned that are applicable to anyone working on any collaborative project.

Erin Robinson is the Executive Director of the Earth Science Information Partners (ESIP). She leverages her knowledge of environmental informatics, in particular collaborative web technologies to support the diverse communities of practice that make up ESIP. Her current research interest include improving collaboration among distributed partners by enhancing connections at various levels in the interoperability stack, coordinating events to enhance human-to-human relationships, developing collaborative sites that integrate social media to facilitate knowledge exchange and sharing Earth observations through standard data access.

Seminar will be webcast at: http://www.fin.ucar.edu/it/mms/fl-live.htm

Tuesday, 06 December 2016, 3:30 PM
Refreshments 3:15 PM
NCAR-Foothills Laboratory - 3450 Mitchell Lane
Bldg 2 Large Auditorium (Rm1022)