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I reached out to the TRUSE organizers to ask if geoscience as a science discipline was forgotten or unwelcome. It turns out that the TRUSE conference was specifically funded for chem, math, physics, and biology. That said, researchers from other disciplines are welcome. Here is an email from the organizers that was just sent out to a broader community with more information about the process.

Cheers
Julie

Greetings all,

The organizers for TRUSE are deeply committed to providing a rich conference centered on deep, meaningful conversations among DBER researchers. Originally, we felt the best way to facilitate this goal was by having a “first-come first-serve” registration for our 2017 TRUSE conference. However, the overwhelming interest from the community (for example, the 124 highly qualified applications for only 10 Graduate Student/Post Doc travel awards!) has given us pause; we need to avoid the problems associated with a large number of persons vying to be the first to submit an application. The field is growing! And now we need a way to accommodate that growth.

One option would be to increase the number of participants at TRUSE. However, given the goal of facilitating rich conversations, the venue size limits our participant count to 125 (of which 35 spots are already filled by Travel Award winners, external evaluators for the conference, plenary speakers, and organizers). As such, the TRUSE organizers have decided we need to instead pursue the option of having a formalized selection process for applications. We recognize this is a change from previous years, and want to assure everyone that we are dedicated to making the selection process transparent and equitable. To support this selection process, the TRUSE Application is a slightly modified NSF 2-pg biosketch. You can find the template form at this link: https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B2Yl1_HIdZA-aTA0bjRQNHlCRjQ <https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B2Yl1_HIdZA-aTA0bjRQNHlCRjQ>

We will begin accepting applications immediately after this email is sent and will continue doing so through April 1st.

Below is the formal selection process that will be used this year based on the set of applications received by April 1.

The organizers will create a pool of current researchers in DBER, that is, those individuals that are enthusiastic and actively engaged in research within a math or science discipline, and not persons that are at an initial stage of “interested in or consumers of DBER”. Once that pool has been created we will divide it by discipline of interest. Given that the conference is intentionally interdisciplinary, and that NSF funding was provided specifically for researchers in Biology, Chemistry, Mathematics and Physics, we will begin with those fields but also include other DBER-fields as needed. Within each of the four target disciplines, the organizers will select no more than five individuals for their outstanding contributions to DBER, especially those that have worked across disciplines, and those persons will be given the opportunity to register (~20 slots). The remaining 70 open registration slots will be selected randomly from the pool of DBER researchers that was created after it has been sorted by discipline. We will aim to have an equal number selected from each of the four targeted disciplines and a similar number from the pool of DBER researchers from other disciplines.

Please send a Please send a PDF file of your TRUSE Application to: [log in to unmask] <mailto:[log in to unmask]>

Our goal is to send out invitations to those selected faculty and graduate students by April 14th. If selected applicants have not registered after a specified amount of time, alternates will be selected and given the opportunity to register. Registration costs are estimated to be approximately $700 to cover costs for all lodging, the majority of meals, and conference facility fees, etc.

One of the explicit goals of this conference is to engage in discussion about the needs of this growing DBER community. The tremendous interest in this conference, and the resulting necessary changes to the application process, are but one example of how we must work together to address these needs. We look forward to having those conversations with you in July.

Best regards,

Warren Christensen

Chris Rasmussen

John Thompson

Marcy Towns