NWA Headquarters Update: 5/15/20

Transcript:

Janice Bunting:
Hi everyone. The day that we are recording this is May 15th and the NWA staff and I wanted to give you an update of what we are doing, not in the office, but working remotely. I'm sure a lot of you have questions about various things. And so we're going to address them here and let you know what we've been up to.

Janice Bunting:
First of all, I hope you are all doing well, hope you and your families are staying safe and just want to let you know that we appreciate all the work that you are all doing. Continuing during this time, working all sorts of shifts, putting out forecasts and warnings and communicating that to the public or to your customers. So keep up the good work and we're expecting severe weather here today. We've had a few rounds of that in the last few weeks, and everyone is keeping on doing their duties just as normal. So thank you to all who are doing that, especially during these challenging times.

Janice Bunting:
One of the things that we wanted to address was the annual meeting, because we're starting to get a lot of questions about that. People are wondering if we are still having the annual meeting and what we are doing to plan for any contingencies. Check out President Todd Lericos' May President's message. He addresses this and his message is my message today. We're still hoping and planning for an in person meeting, whether that be full in person meeting or a partial in person meeting, we realize that there's some people that just won't be able to travel or don't feel comfortable traveling, but we want to provide an option for all who plan to attend. So we do have a group led by Rebecca [Maeser 00:01:57] who is investigating contingency plans for either a full in person meeting, a partial in person meeting, or even possibly a full virtual meeting. And so they are looking at all the tools and procedures to do that.

Janice Bunting:
From an office perspective, we are monitoring what's going on with regulations from state and cities and CDC recommendations about social distancing and we will continue to monitor that. I have to admit that consumes a lot of my brain time right now, because we want to have a meaning that's valuable to our members and other attendees, but we also want you all to be safe. So the big takeaway from this is that we are looking at a lot of different things. We are planning for contingencies, plan to block out time for the annual meeting in September and we will open up the hotel block and registration very soon. So we will the meaning in some form or another and stay tuned for that as time goes on.

Janice Bunting:
So another issue that I wanted to bring to your attention is that the NWA has been monitoring an FCC decision regarding some radio frequency spectrum and hopefully you've seen the notices in regards to that. The FCC and unanimously approved a legato application for spectrum. This spectrum isn't directly in the ghost spectrum, but it would have to be used in coordination with that spectrum. So we are concerned about this and there is action from the Senate Armed Services Committee to addressing this. So I would encourage you to check out information on our website and on our advocacy page about letters and other statements that we've been signing onto. And there still is an opportunity to contact your Senator if you feel that you want to do that, to express your concerns about the actions going on that could impact the GOES data transmission.

Janice Bunting:
We did have a webinar a few years ago that addressed the sharing issues. And I would encourage you to go back and look at that and we'll provide a link here. And just to be clear, we're not adverse to 5G. We want 5G, we're big data users and we know that especially many of our corporate members rely on internet to disseminate their products, but we're just very concerned that any sharing that goes in the spectrum of GOES and near it could make data unavailable at times that we need it the most. So check that out.

Janice Bunting:
I also want to encourage you to watch our April webinar that we had. It was very good, Becky DePodwin and Rebecca Moulton were the moderators for that. And they had Brandon Bolinsky, who's a meteorologist with FEMA, explaining the challenges of working during the COVID time on national projects that are critical with weather and other things going on and also working from home. And then Dr. Kathleen Alto gave some recommendations of how to deal with the stresses that we're all going through. So please check that out. You can find it on our website, or you can log into the member connect portal and have access to that.

Janice Bunting:
One thing that I learned about recently was decision fatigue, that we're all dealing with work decisions, personal decisions, and things like that. And that many people are finding, after the morning, after making so many more decisions than we usually do, our brains are tired. So I hope you're all finding some time to take care of yourselves. And we're very fortunate, many of our volunteers are also staying active. And I think you'll hear some about some of that here in the updates from Nicole and Bryce, but we appreciate all of our members staying engaged as you can and as you feel fit to do that, to keep our programs moving and to connect with each other, to continue to improve our science and also just to socialize so that people don't feel so cooped up.

Janice Bunting:
So with that, that's what I have right now. I will say that we are still continuing to work remotely just for safety reasons. And we are accessible, if you call the NWA phone number or our emails, we are staying in touch every day and it's always a highlight to find out what Nicole and Bryce are doing. And Nicole does some chasing, so she's been keeping us informed about what she sees out there. There's been some beautiful storms in Oklahoma lately. Unfortunately many have had big hail, which is a big risk today, and we will be keeping our eyes on that. So I am going to turn this over to Nicole to give her update. See y'all soon.

Nicole Van Every:
Thanks, Janice. Hello and happy Friday. I'm Nicole Van Every and I wanted to give you an update on just a couple areas within the NWA headquarters. The first one has to do with Seal holders. So this is just a reminder that Seal holders, especially those of you who are due this December of 2020, but also for all Seal holders, it's never too early to start on earning your CEUs. You use do, you can earn all 10 from the comfort of your home online. This is just a reminder that COMET modules can be taken for up to six CEUs. And then also webinars can be watched for four CEUs. So six plus four equals 10, through those modules and webinars you have your requirement for your three years. So this is also a reminder that if you do decide to do webinars, just write up a short paragraph about your takeaways, what you learned, and you can submit that with your documentation.

Nicole Van Every:
Also on our NWA website, under the Seal of Approval tab, be looking for some updates that will help point you in a more direct way to how you can earn your CEUs and I'm also going to be uploading a Seal FAQ page, so watch for that. Also just a reminder about the scholarships and grants deadline. The deadline for scholarships is May 28th and the deadline for the Sol Hirsch grant is June 9th. So be sure to pass the word along to students and educators for that wonderful opportunity through our Foundation.

Nicole Van Every:
If you have any questions about Seals or scholarships or grant applications, just shoot me an email. It's Nicole@nwas.org and you can also give us a call. Have a great day.

Bryce McElhaney:
Hey everyone, Bryce here. Just have a couple more updates for you. Just wanted to give a thanks to everyone who submitted their nominations for the 2020 annual awards, that deadline closed on Thursday, May 14th. The awards nominations are open year round, but that was the deadline for this year. So again, thank you so much for submitting.

Bryce McElhaney:
Outside of that. We have a new JOM article that will be published on May 18th, that will be on Monday. So be on the lookout for that, stay up to date with our latest JOM articles on our website, you can visit that at nwas.org under the publications tab. Stay connected through the NWA app. You can search your app store and type in National Weather Association and receive updates on the annual meeting as they come in, as well as JOM articles, webinars, and much more.

Bryce McElhaney:
Lastly joined the conversation on our NWA distance socials, where members can discuss anything and everything. Our next one will be Thursday, May 22nd at 7:30 PM, that's central time. And I think that's about it for me.

Janice Bunting:
All right. Thanks for those updates, Nicole and Bryce. I appreciate it. I am very fortunate to have great staff helping us through this, and they are working very hard and you can see my other coworker, you can tell I never did TV back here is sound asleep. Fortunately, he didn't disrupt this meeting too much. One of these days, we might do a blooper reel from these videos. We're fortunate that Bryce has excellent editing skills to make us all look like we said all of our pieces without any bloopers, but standby. One of these days, we might release that.

Janice Bunting:
But the bottom line is we hope you are all doing well and staying safe. And if you have any questions at all, please contact us. I know some of you are still receiving the invoice reminders. If you're having any challenges paying some of the invoices, please reach out to us, we will work with you. But stay safe, watch for annual meeting updates. The Annual Meeting Committee is about ready to release the disposition on the abstracts. And then later this summer we'll have agenda come out after we work on contingency plans and see how the next few weeks, a month go. And we hope to see as many of you in Tulsa in September. And if you like these video updates, let us know and we will stay in touch. So take care and we will all talk to you soon.

Comments are closed.