Associate Professor, Texas Tech University, Lubbock, TX, USA

AGU embraces the global community and welcomes diverse leaders from around the world, representing various identities, voices, and perspectives. List any identities, voices, and perspectives you would bring, including but not limited to nationality, regional representations, racial and ethnic backgrounds, and any other identity you feel comfortable sharing.

I am a first-generation college student who benefitted immensely from early exposure to the Atmospheric and Space Electricity (ASE) community, so I carry with me a strong sense of AGU ASE’s value in serving as an introduction to the cultural norms and relationships that undergird the scientific profession. As faculty at a newer R1 school that is also a designated Hispanic Serving Institution, I have a record of working with and mentoring students from populations underrepresented in the sciences, both at the undergraduate and graduate levels.

Volunteer experience that relates to this position:

American Meteorological Society (AMS), Chair, Scientific and Technological Activities Commission, Atmospheric Electricity Committee, 2016-2018, and Member, January 2012-2015. Chaired/planned 8th Conference on Meteorological Applications of Lightning data at the AMS Annual Meeting, January 2017.

University Corporation for Atmospheric Research, Unidata Users Committee, Member, August 2018 - October 2021; and Strategic Advisory Committee, Member, October 2021 - present.

As one of the elected leaders of your section, how will you partner with your president and president-elect to communicate with and engage your members to help implement AGU’s strategic plan including its mission and vision?

AGU’s strategic plan emphasizes advocacy for scientific impact and support for translational scientific activities, which are necessary to confront the challenges faced by society in a changing climate. The strategic plan frames AGU’s origins as a discovery-based scientific society as a historical strength, but offers little strategy related to sustaining capacity for the quiet, long-term work that is the foundation of translational science. In that context, ASE leadership plays an important role in organizing Fall Meeting sessions in a way that sustains scientific interchange and in advocates for the needs of membership while promoting ASE science in AGU’s more public-facing venues. I will work with the ASE president and president-elect to sustain AGU’s critical role as a premier annual meeting place for the ASE community, and to include the next generation of scientists in a way that builds a healthy and vibrant scientific community.

Section affiliations:

Atmospheric and Space Electricity; Atmospheric Sciences; Nonlinear Geophysics