Students (Virtually) Join MDL - MDL

Dec 01, 2020

As is usually the case, this spring/summer, MDL welcomed a new group of student employees into the fold to help us with a variety of projects and to help provide them with “real-world” work experiences outside of academia.  This year, however, those experiences came under some rather unusual and unforeseen circumstances.  With the onset of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19), MDL transitioned to a completely remote work environment, which created some unique challenges with onboarding, orientation, and integration of our new student hires into the daily workflow at MDL.  In fact, four of the five new students completed the entirety of their tenures without ever setting foot inside of the building at SSMC.  Despite all this, the students and their mentors alike seem to have adapted to the unusual circumstances quite well.

The table below lists the five students who joined us this spring as part of three different internship programs, along with their Divisional affiliations, projects, and dates of tenure:

MDL is perhaps most familiar with the Federal government’s Pathways program, as we have had numerous students join us in past years under that program or under its predecessor, the Student Career Employment Program (SCEP), many of whom eventually converted to career MDL or NWS employees.  This year, Chris Smith and Katelyn Zigner came to work in SMD and DSD, respectively.  Chris spent his rather short time here as a Pathways summer student learning about the National Blend of Models (NBM) and how to use our experimental product viewers for verification.  He put these new skills to work generating case studies of recent hurricanes, which were useful to SMD staff working on the new tropical cyclone feature matching algorithm.

Katelyn will be with us for a full year--until June 2021.  She is a PhD candidate working with the LAMP group to expand upon verification work done during the summer by Sean Melanson for DSD under the Lapenta program.  Whereas Sean concentrated on a verifying output from a new LAMP conditional ceiling and visibility algorithm, Katelyn is taking a look at the performance of the more “traditional” LAMP forecasts of these elements, which use input from the High-Resolution Rapid Refresh (HRRR) model.  She will also be helping out with future updates to LAMP temperature and dewpoint guidance.  Many of us have already interacted with her during the regular LAMP group meetings and LAMP/MOS/NBM synergy calls, and many more of us most certainly will be in the coming months.  (Author’s note:  Katelyn’s PhD work also is especially relevant and timely given this summer’s events.  She welcomes inquiries if you’d like to know more.)

Two of the students, Sean Melanson and Elvin Liu, came to us from the William M. Lapenta NWS Student Internship Program, newly-renamed in honor of the former NCEP Director who passed away tragically last year.  Typically, NCEP offers about 15-20 internships to 3^rd and 4^th year undergraduates as well as graduate students, most of whom work in EMC, CPC, or other NCEP centers.  2020 marked the second year that students from the Lapenta program have come to work in MDL.  For the first time this year, MDL was invited to give an overview of the Lab’s work to the full contingent of program students and administrators.  This talk was well received, so we hope to expand our association with the program in the coming years.

Sean worked with LAMP scientists who are experimenting with a new decision tree algorithm called “Super Ceiling/Visibility” for constructing conditional forecasts of these elements based on LAMP expectation of precipitation occurrence.  He also produced several verifications that compared the performance of this new algorithm to ceiling and visibility forecasts from the existing LAMP system.  Elvin worked with DFSD on code which introduced new features into the NBM comparative viewer, and helped to track down and quash several bugs that had been present in the system for quite a while.  Both students presented their findings to the full group of Lapenta students and administrators at a workshop held as a wrap-up to this summer’s program.  Sean’s presentation, as well as Elvin's, are available in NCEP's archive of the proceedings.

​​​​Briah’ Davis joined MDL through the NOAA Experimental Research and Training Opportunities (NERTO) program.  Representatives from SMD and DSD participated in last year’s NERTO “Project Fest” in which students presented results of their work and listened to presentations covering ongoing activities and potential projects in MDL.  Briah’s internship with us was a welcome and positive outcome of our outreach efforts.  Specifically, Briah’ worked with Judy Ghirardelli and the LAMP group to examine the characteristics of observations from satellite and ground-based lightning detection networks over Florida and the Caribbean.  Her study will help the LAMP group to better understand the behavior of the predictand datasets which are used as ground truth for developing convection and lightning forecast guidance.   Her final presentation to the NERTO program is available here.

Many of our students acknowledged the challenges presented by an all-telework environment, mainly in terms of not being able to meet their colleagues “in person,” or to establish some of the professional contacts that would have come more naturally if everyone were together in SSMC.  By the end of the summer, though, it was evident that they had integrated into MDL and its day-to-day workflow quite well.  Having previous familiarity with G-suite and other tools in use at MDL to promote collaboration during the pandemic was a major factor that students cited for their successful transition into remote work.  For instance, Sean noted: “Working remotely was certainly a challenge, but the ease and connectivity of the entire Google system made communication seamless and allowed me to connect with people from NOAA all over the country just as easily as with my mentor.  All in all, I really felt a part of the team.”  Chris concurred, saying that: “Every person I reached out to was willing to meet and really tried to answer all of my questions. The webinars and meetings provided great scientific information that I had not yet learned.”  Chris was particularly pleased with the opportunities that he had to present results of his NBM wind verifications for hurricanes Isaias and Genevieve (eastern Pacific) during regular coordination meetings with other NBM tropical cyclone specialists.  He shared these verifications and some more overall impressions of his time at MDL in an informal exit presentation: C. Smith Summer 2020 MDL Internship.

​​Another factor that frequently was cited by the students as instrumental in their success was the level of personal and professional guidance that their MDL mentors and other staff were able to provide under these trying conditions, as well as the ability and freedom to experiment and grow as budding scientists during their time with us.  Katelyn noted that her internship has provided “opportunities for both individual and team-based work”, and further added that: “Everyone I've interacted with has been extremely helpful and friendly.”  Sean was particularly complimentary of the efforts of his mentors in DSD and LAMP, stating: “What really stood out to me was the dedication of my mentor, Judy Ghirardelli, as well as the entire LAMP team.  Everyone was always ready to help me with my project in any and every way possible.”  High praise, indeed!

From the MDL perspective, one of the historical barriers to being able to hire the “best and brightest” students has been that some may be separated by their enrollment in schools located in other parts of the country, or may otherwise live long distances from MDL.  Understandably, many are reluctant to move cross-country and/or may be apprehensive about their ability to find adequate and affordable temporary housing near physical workplaces like MDL and SSMC.  If nothing else, remote work opportunities help to alleviate these concerns.  The COVID pandemic is already beginning to change the way the Federal workforce does business and things are likely to continue to change in the future, especially with regard to remote work.  The results and feedback from our 2020 student experience are likely to help our managers make these student internships even more productive and rewarding in the coming years for both the students and MDL alike.