Meetings - notes

4th of June 2013 - 15:00 - Brainstorming - at GFI

Brainstorming for future ResClim/our subgorup activities

Agenda:

1. Any burning issues, new people? (5-10 min)
2. Are we happy with the ideas? (15 min)
   1. Are there more ideas than to the list below?
   2. Is there some ideas which should not be further developped?
3. Divide into groups for brainstorming (group for each idea)
4. Brainstorming for say 45 min - 1h
   1. Core ideas for the class (initial plan?), pros and cons, some lecturers
      1. Short action plan to make it happen?
5. Wrap it up, present the plan (15-30 min)
   1. Groups should figure out persons to push things further
6. -> beer :D

Some Initial ideas for the classes

1. (Climate?) modelling course/workshop?
   • Many of us are using modelling more or less extensively as a part of our thesis and even if one wouldn’t be using any model, it would be very beneficial to have some kind of knowledge of running some simulations.
     • The idea of the course would be to study one specific test case with a model. Ideally this test case would involve changing the code slightly and setting up the test case and then of course running it. The analysis of the results would be probably interesting, but not in the main role of this course.
     • Test cases could be also some sensitivity tests. This way the course could benefit the model development and at the same time teach a lot about the model
     • The course could be maybe intensive with one week of lectures and then a period of say 1 month for running the simulations and performing the analysis and then 1 day for the final seminars (maybe webinar so that people don't need to travel for one day).
   • Caveats?
     • Might be computer expensive, data storage?
     • Too difficult to formulate specific questions?
   • Other questions?
     • Need for outside lecturers? (probably not if NorESM is used)
       • Although it might be interesting to have someone (names:)
     • What would be the benefits of having a class of our own and not participating e.g. some of the ones offered already?
       • There happens to exist this kind of class in the University of Helsinki/Finnish met institute, where they choose a different model each time and do some specific tests and write a short report. This class is also offered as a web-course for anyone interested. There is also a the European Earth System and Climate Modelling School lead by the NCAS & MPI-M.
       • However it might be interesting to have a course of our own which could for example use the NorESM model and benefit its development. This way ResClim students would also have a guaranteed place on the class.
2. WRF workshop?
   • A Number of people in Bergen are using WRF and might struggle with similar problems
   • Workshop could give a general overview of the model and the most usual caveats and then maybe look into user specific cases
3. Something else
   • Project planning/leading class (something along these lines was offered for the postdocs by the university, but should this be something for PhD's already?)
   • Something on science-policy interface (is this already covered by the scientific communication class?)
     • This could also be an interesting workshop

8th of May 2013 - 15:00 - Kick off - Helland Hansen at GFI

Agenda & minutes, decisions marked with A

1. Why are we here: short introduction to the idea (by Aleksi)
   
   
2. Discussion
   • Should there be two separate groups for PhD's and Post Docs
   • A: Yes, two groups with partly joint meetings
     • Should we just divide immediately, if we think this is the case?
   • Who should be involved? (whole BCCR community?)
   • A: Yes, this should be ResClim subgroup involving all the ResClim students in Bergen
   • What kind of format should we have?
     • Presentations, problem solving events, 'what went wrong' -presentations, brainstorming events?
     • All these are good ideas. Meeting frequency should be something in order of 2-3 in a semester (~once in two months). It was decided that the next meeting will be a brainstorming event
   • Role of the webpage: gather information about all the practicalities (put the 'How to survive' -file from the old PhD forum online)
     
     
3. Core group?
   • Since nothing works without responsible persons we should probably decide who want to be in charge of organizing meetings etc.
   • A: We decided that in each meeting we will choose a person responsible for sending around emails for the next meeting
     • This way we will spread the workload and hopefully keep the task of the 'responsible' person as a low level thing so that people don't feel that it takes too much of their time
       
       
4. Next 'meeting'
   • Brainstorming event and beer afterwards, 4th of June