Raffle for AGI's Most Popular Publications!

Come share your thoughts about connecting geoscience graduate and employer needs at the YES Network-APECS town hall meeting today (7pm, Room 5), and you could win one of AGI's most popular publications: the Glossary of Geology or the Geoscience Handbook. To enter the drawing for the raffle, sign up on the YES Network sheet at the town hall meeting. The lucky winners will be drawn tonight and will be notified by email tomorrow. Prizes can be picked up at the AGI exhibit booth (59) at 3pm on Thursday. Thank you to the American Geological Institute for providing these prizes!

And the winners are...
... Todd Albert - Glossary of Geology
... Matheswaran Karthikeyan - Geoscience Handbook

Congratulations to both!

April 5th is YES Network day at EGU 2011!

What a whirlwind of a day at EGU! No kidding about the whirlwind either. There were high winds and rain showers that rolled in as I headed out to the conference center this afternoon. As soon as everyone got off the train, the winds unleashed and rain came down in horizontal sheets. Then as fast as it came, it was gone. The day seemed to whirl right by just as fast.

Prof. Aberra Mogessie, who served on the Scientific Committee for the YES Africa Symposium and presented at the Opening Ceremony stopped by to chat with AGI and YES Network members at the AGI booth (#59).

I also saw a couple of great posters about developing networks of geoscientists committed to working on natural hazard issues, and to providing the data sets as open access. That reminded me of the virtual roundtable discussions at the YES Africa Symposium this January. Here are some links to the abstracts, so those of you who are already collaborating on these type of projects can expand your network with some more people who are interested in the same topic. Here's the link to the abstracts at the poster session this afternoon entitled: Global capacity building efforts in Seismology.

That leads us into tomorrow which is the main YES Network day at EGU 2011. We kick off the day with lunch at noon. We're all going to meet at the booth #59 and go out to eat lunch. If the weather is nice, we'll head over to the park right behind the conference center. Then there is the poster session at 5:30-7pm in Hall XL followed by the YES Network-APECS town hall session "Career development: How do we integrate geoscience graduate and employer needs?" at 7pm in Room 5.

I just checked the stats, and we have over 60 web-based participants registered for the YES Network-APECS townhall tomorrow, and a large majority are YES Network members! We're really looking forward to having you all join us for the discussion. Please keep spreading the word about the town hall. We are very much looking forward to making this a super-interactive session by bringing together our web-participants and in-person audience. So the more people we have online and in the room, the better!

After the town hall is over, we'll be headed out to Cafe Einstein for the YES Network-APECS networking social. Thank you again to AGU and SCAR for sponsoring this event. We'll see you all tomorrow either in the virtual world at the townhall, or in person here at EGU.

Join us at EGU 2011!

In case you haven't seen our busy YES Network schedule yet, it's posted at http://www.networkyes.org/index.php/meetings/egu_2011/

We've got a lot of activities planned from two technical sessions that YES Network members are co-convening (one on sedimentology and stratigraphy and another on global geoscience capacity building), a town hall session on career development issues pertaining to connecting employer and geoscience graduate needs, and several social outings. Check the YES Network website for the latest updates to our schedule.

This year we actually have booth space at EGU, and a special thanks to the American Geological Institute for providing us with the space. Stop on by Exhibit booth #59 to chat with other YES Network members, pick up a copy of our newsletter or flyer, and a YES Network sticker for your EGU name badge.

If you are coming to EGU this year, please email Jo (networkyes.president[at]gmail.com - Subject line: Attending EGU 2011) so we can keep in touch with you during the meeting. Also, if you want us to post your presentation on our schedule of events, email Leila (lmg[at]agiweb.org).

We hope to see you in Vienna!

YES Network sessions at EGU 2011 - Abstracts Due 10 Jan!

The European Geosciences Union (EGU) General Assembly 2011 meeting will be in Vienna, Austria from 03-08 April 2011.

Abstracts are now being accepted for all sessions and we encourage all YES Network members to submit their abstracts as there are many exciting sessions! The deadline for abstract submissions is 10 January 2011.

Please visit the EGU 2011 website for more information about how to submit your abstract and for information about financial support: http://meetings.copernicus.org/egu2011/home.html

Please especially note the following sessions that are being convened and/or co-convened by YES Network members:
(If you are a YES Network member and are convening a session at EGU that we have not listed here, please let us know and we'll update this post to show your session information.)

SSP1.2: Recent advances in fluvial sedimentology and stratigraphy
Convener: Andrew Wilson
Co-Conveners: Arnold Reesink , Andreas Rittersbacher , Joanne Venus

Fluvial deposits contain some of our most precious groundwater and hydrocarbon resources, are archives of paleo-environmental conditions, are sensitive to environmental change, and rivers themselves are the conduit through which continents are linked to oceans and basins.

The study of both modern and ancient river deposits is therefore critical to our understanding of the effects of forcing factors such as climate and tectonics on drainage networks and sedimentary architecture, and in developing predictive tools for assessing resource potential.

We cordially invite submissions spanning the breadth of fluvial sedimentology and stratigraphy with the aim of providing a comprehensive overview of recent advances in this area by field-based, numerical and experimental methods on both channel- and overbank deposits at a range of temporal and spatial scales.

We encourage submission of interdisciplinary research on current topics such as:
• the use of new technologies for characterisation of fluvial architecture, heterogeneities and facies, and their applications to aquifers and hydrocarbon reservoirs
• unravelling preservation potential to link modern rivers to ancient successions
• quantification of ripple- to catchment-scale sediment dynamics and interactions of the fluvial system with adjacent environments

EOS02/EG3: Cultural and Political Impacts on Building Global Geoscience Human Capacity
Convener: Christopher Keane
Co-Conveners: Leila Gonzales , Sarah Gaines

This session will look at the current global state of affairs in the development of the next generation of geoscientists. In particular, the future population of geoscientists is critical to the economic and societal stability and growth of all nations into the foreseeable future. Developed nations face the immediate need to replace their current aging population of geoscientists, whereas developing nations have an immediate need to cultivate human and capital infrastructure to support the training of future geoscientists. International collaborative efforts must be made into new energy and mineral sources and enabling the appropriate stewardship of the environment. However, will the developing world be able to educate enough geoscientists to meet their own social and economic needs in building sustainable economies while protecting their natural environment into the future? Presentations that examine these themes, and particularly these topics are encouraged:
• Broad surveys of the state of the geoscience workforce across national boundaries
• The cultural and social impacts on the next generation of geoscientists
• Programs that are focused on improving capacity building in developing nations and underrepresented populations
• The transferability of geoscience credentials across political boundaries
• The mobility of geoscientists across political and organizational boundaries
• How different national strategies are addressing domestic geoscience issues and the need for expertise
• The role of the private sector in training local workforce and strategies for cooperation with the public sector.