Special Symposium on the Future of Weather, Forecasting, and Practice

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As the AMS celebrates its 100th anniversary, it is natural to look forward in contemplation of future developments in “advancing science, serving society”. The Special Symposium on the Future of Weather, Forecasting, and Practice will feature invited speakers, panel discussions, and small group meetups exploring the evolving connections between research, operations, and practice, and our role in shaping their future forms.

Speakers invited from national modeling centers will present their organization’s vision for the future, and a forum will feature panelists with expertise in research, operations, and practice discussing transitions and interactions among those realms. For more immediate research to operations transitions a Research Operations Nexus (RON) Meetup, honoring the legacy of Ronald W. Przybylinski, will be held to provide the opportunity for an interactive "meetup" between research and operational meteorologists. The groups will rotate through a number of stations in speed-mentoring fashion and discuss a variety of ideas and themes that could benefit forecast and warning operations. The goal is simple: to build and develop new relationships in the nexus! This year, an additional RON session will follow, where you will have the chance to listen to R2O/O2R success stories, and experts will provide information on how to succeed in O2R/R2O. There will be no additional cost to attend. More information, including date, time, and location, will be provided in the future.

Finally, the future role of humans will be addressed in a new initiative called “The Evolving Role of the Human in Weather Prediction and Communication”. Between 2004 and 2006, symposia on the future role of the human in the forecast process were conducted at meetings of the AMS. The proceedings and recommendations from the symposia were published in BAMS. Since the original symposia 10-15 years ago, there have been many changes in the role of humans in the forecast process and many new roles that have been created in this era of social media, smart technology and artificial intelligence. A team of meteorologists and social scientists representing all sectors of the weather and climate enterprise will be conducting webinars throughout the year as well as four panel discussions to solicit input on how the role of humans should evolve in the future. The four panel discussions will cover:

  • Development of automated forecasting tools: types, the human role in their design
  • Use of automated forecasting tools versus humans
  • Training and proficiency for future forecasting
  • Envisioning the future forecast process

We highly encourage interested parties to attend the sessions and take an active role in the panel discussions and RON Meetup. We recommend papers and posters with research in these areas be submitted to closely related conferences, including the 10th Conference on the Transition of Research to Operations and the 8th Symposium on Building a Weather Ready Nation.

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