YPP - Meeting

Local:

Florencia Canelli (convening), Linda Coney, Bonnie Fleming, Andrew Green, Ben Kilminster,
John Krane, Michel Sorel, Morgan Wascko, Sam Zeller

Remote:
BNL: Vivek Jain
Cornell: Veronique Boisvert
Columbia: Joe Formaggio, Jocelyn Monroe
SLAC: Abi Soffer, Ben Brau, Chris Potter, Wolfgang Walkowiak, Amanda Weinstein

Meeting Agenda

The meeting:

• I. Email lists & web pages
  • John K agreed to be the YPP email list Czar for now
  • The current lists are:
    • ypp@fnal.gov (the global one)
    • ypp_fnal@fnal.gov (the Fermilab chapter)
    • yppslac@yahoogroups.com (SLAC chapter)
  • He will maintain a "list of lists," and local chapters will keep up with their own members. This will serve as the global YPP mailing list.
  • There is also a ypp_exec@fnal.gov list that will be maintained.

• II. Florencia -- Town Meeting coming up.
  • The meeting will be in about 2 weeks.
  • Should there be an offical YPP response to the HEPAP report?
    Yes, Morgan and Bonnie are working on a draft response.
  • Also, the HEPAP subpanel report is at http://fnth37.fnal.gov/hepap.pdf

• III. Survey Presentations
  • Robin Erbacher is currently in Mexico, so Florencia gave Robin's report
    • She has given survey talks at SLAC, LBL, Princeton & Rutgers.
    • Questions from SLAC audience regarding possible dominance of DESY respondants to the survey. Was CERN just as well-represented? This was raised because so many of the Snowmass attendees were from DESY.
    • Good response (lots of Q's) from Princeton, and especially Rutgers crowd.

  • Ben Kilminster gave talks at LNS (Cornell/CESR) and Brookhaven. Feedback from audience:
    • Needed more questions on life & family and health insurance issues. John Krane commented that that is actually how the surveying got started at Fermilab a few years ago, but people wanted more physics questions.
    • Typical comments: "Doing a great thing!", "Never seen this happen before", etc.
    • Should also have questions for people who left physics, or are planning on leaving.
    • We need to find a way to evaluate HEP from the standpoint of other academic fields and physicists in other areas.
    • Surprise at the fair amount of agreement between responses of young and tenured.

  • John Krane gave his survey presentation at the Fermilab Colloquium on August 15, 2001 to a full room and it was about 40 minutes long, with a very positive response.

• IV. Chapter Reports
  • Cornell (Veronique)
    Veronique will be going to CERN in May, and she will work on recruiting YPP members for a European chapter. She has noted some interest, but not very much so far. (Sam Zeller will also head to CERN in January to recruit and lay the groundwork for YPP activism.)
    • The Cornell chapter has ~10 grad students, 3 post docs. There is also interest from the local SPS chapter (undergrads).
    • The people there seem to be very interested in the issues and projects that YPP is pursuing, rather than the structure of YPP.

  • Brookhaven (Vivek)
    
    • Sent message to everyone at the lab about YPP
    • The response was limited, but this is mostly a nuclear physics and condensed matter lab.
    • Eight (8) of the respondents were YP's and 4 were tenured.
    • Suggested to Vivek to send a message to Stony Brook since it is close to Brookhaven.

  • SLAC (Wolfgang) -- showed slides; see also: http://www-project.slac.stanford.edu/ypp/resources/gmtg/
    
    • emailed SLAC users (SLUO) list to recruit
    • 1st YPP chapter meeting Oct 8,2001, 22 attendees
    • Web-page: http://www-project.slac.stanford.edu/ypp/
    • Outreach meeting to review current activities that SLAC is already doing, and see what YPP Outreach can do to contribute.
    • Giving a seminar "HEP funding 101" from a senior physicist. (John Krane requested that it be web-cast ).
    • Idea of a Q&A on Future Facilities, globalization issues
    • With respect to congressional outreach, we must be careful to not get into lobbying with public funds, like from the proposed NSF grant.
    • Big Discussion on bylaws from Wolfgang ... see slides & later notes in this memorandum.

• V. NSF Grant report (Jocelyn Monroe)
  
  • See the document that Jocelyn wrote on the web:
    http://www-d0.fnal.gov/~canelli/ypp/NSF.ps The portions in red were the topics of discussion today.
  • Split proposal to YPP overhead costs & travel vs. Educational Outreach.
  • 3 year grant
  • Continuing discussions with Marv Wolberg at NSF. He has had a great deal of influence on the writing of the grant.
  • No mention of outreach to government --> is that ok?
  • How do we manage the money? Perhaps grant management should be part of the bylaws.
  • Could utilize annual summer conferences of educators to tap those people for help and for contacts.
  • How are the project kits integrated into the current programs? This definitely needs thought.
  • How are we adding value to our research via the outreach in this grant? That is a major issue being pushed by NSF people reviewing the grant.
  • The amount requested is 17K/year for outreach, and 4k/yr for travel and operating.
  • Apparently, the proposal is about a month past the official NSF deadline, but that is ok if we hurry. We are working directly with Marvin on this, and he is cutting us some slack.

• VI. Bylaws discussion, main points (Michel Sorel)
  -see also Wolfgang's slides -- SLAC chapter report -- that were presented at the meeting: http://www-project.slac.stanford.edu/ypp/resources/gmtg/
  • Make bylaws committee (Chris, Michel, Bonnie)
  • Decide on the procedure & schedule for ratifying the bylaws
  • We will eventuall specify ratification procedure, like who votes etc. in January 10 meeting.
  • Review of bylaws by local chapters (open to all YPP participants), and comments should be sent to Michel Sorel, who will compile them into a final bylaws document.
  • Current bylaws ratification schedule (this was moved up from the SLAC-proposed schedule to accomodate for YPP elections. We want the bylaws to be in good shape before the elections):
    • Nov 15, 01 -- Charge to Bylaws Committee
    • Nov 30, 01 -- Deadline for commments on draft
    • Dec 5, 01 -- Second draft available for comments
    • Dec 25, 01 -- Deadline for 2nd round of comments
    • Jan ~10, 02 -- Reps meet again to further clarify & set date for ratification
    • Jan ~15, 02 -- Vote for ratification. This is tentative since the meeting on the 10th will determine what really happens.
    • Feb -- YPP elections

  • Michel also presented an organizational diagram of the YPP structure .

• VII. Outreach at Fermilab (Linda Coney)
  
  • Mostly working on grant proposal
  • In contact with Lederman Center people, especially Susan Dahl on volunteering to interact with tours, school groups, etc.
  • Recently not been happening due to security concerns and cancellations, but groups are starting to come back.
  • Also, there is a program starting up (via Lederman?) which focusses HEP outreach to female students.
  • Andrew Green & Linda Coney and whoever else wants to join is registered with Lederman center to give occasional presentations to children on and off the lab.

• VIII. Globalization (John Krane)
  (see slides on http://www-d0.fnal.gov/~jkrane/ypp/globalization/glob_plans_rc.ps)
  • Gudrid: US physicists cannot get EU fellowships
  • Remote control of D0:
    • In general, this concept has met with some success: DESY has controlled the Tevatron for a short period a couple of weeks ago.
    • Phase 1a -- preparations:
      • Time in motion studies (how often something has to be done which involves something physical with the detector not on a console).
      • Reviewing software changes, and what remote users are allowed to do. When something is being controlled remotely, it may need to be locked out to keep local users from unknowingly goofing something up.
      • Computing security
    • Phase 1b - enabling:
      • Permision from D0 collaboration
      • Funding for additional work
      • Find partners, like in Fermi Computing Division
    • Phase II - Local Fermilab tests
    • Phase III - Local, but offsite. like John's living room, (but don't get it mixed up with Grand Tourismo)
    • Phase IV - Long-Range US
    • Phase V - International

• IX. Young Physisist Issues (Morgan Wascko)
  
  • Talked to Fermilab users group, UEC on health-care issues, and the response from them was positive.
  • Talked to Visa office people on making things easier for international scientists.
  • Has also contacted the users group at SLAC for what they are doing in the quality of life arena.