- Thanks for making time in the schedule to have this discussion. Back in January, I presented the overview of the ExoExplorers program, which, you know, we hadn't done anything yet. So it was more about, you know, talking about what we would do and now in June, as the program is closing, we wanted to talk about what we did and, you know, hear any feedback from you either, you know, during this time or afterwards I'll have some links that we can forward to you afterwards. All right. So just for those who haven't been, you know, so those of you who have been living under a rock, no, I'm kidding. For those of you who are busy doing other things, you know, just to give you a brief overview of what the ExoExplorers program was is, is kind of these three kind of tenants. I would say, really comprised at the motivation for this program. So really, I would say that one of the main ones was visibility you know. In the time of the COVID-19 pandemic, when we're all working virtually, other fewer opportunities, very limited opportunities for early career scientists to really interact and promote their work and, you know, build those networks that are so critical for career development going forward in the field. And so it was really our goal to create an internal network. So creating this cohort where they could interact with one another, but then also, sorry, keeping time here, also an external network for then, coordinating with, you know, prominent Exoplanet scientists in the field. We wanna cultivate their careers as much as we can. Of course, in the age of inclusion, as we, so many folks already have talked about inclusion, and now that it's especially a core value of NASA, it's even more timely to, you know, really amplify not only early career scientists, especially from BIPO Communities and so that was our component of this program. And then finally, of course, it really ties back to the science. You know, we really wanted to use the framework of the ExEP Science Gap List to serve as a touchstone or just a guidance for shaping what this program would look like and what this cohort would look like. And so, as I said, the first ExoExplorers cohort is wrapping up, you know, how did we do? And Jennifer, I think my watch isn't working. So if you can give me a reminder, somebody much appreciated. Okay, so here's the cohorts, the 2021 cohort, and so I'm showing them again, they've each given excellent talks over the course of this six months program, participated in array of activities and so I really, you know, wanna thank them, some of whom are on the line for their participation, for their excellent science and I sincerely hope that they, you know, got something out of it and look forward to hearing from them about how we can make this program better. Okay. So again, in January I talked about, you know, what, what we ExoExplorers this cohort would do and so this is just a recap of what they did do. So the ExoExplorer talks, which I would say was the main component of the ExoExplorers in their kind of science activities, commenced in February of this year, concluded in June of this year and so there were pairwise talks. So each month there were from February to June, there were two of the ExoExplorers that talked at roughly 25 minutes each on their science. And they were all excellent. They were all very well attended. There was lots of good participation and good energy, I would say at each of these events and so, I think they went over very well. I'll remind everyone that all of these talks are posted online. So if there's one that you missed, if there was a talk that you were interested in, they're all posted online for almost all of them. Maybe not the June one yet, but at least most of them are posted online. So that was kind of component one and one kind of ancillary thing that bore out of the program actually, it wasn't in our original plan, but in talking with the organizing committee and the steering committee on what, you know, additional things that we could support them with, we kind of handled this like, you know, when you, you give a colloquium talk at an institution, right? You have a set of meetings scheduled with folks at those institutions, but in this virtual environment, we had really the benefit of, you know, for them and, you know, they're their visitors, they're the people that can meet with would really be anyone and so we solicited from the speakers, you know, roughly five names of folks that they'd like to meet with. And so the organizing committee then coordinated those meetings. So simply, you know, reaching out to those names saying, hey, you know, this is an ExoExplorer talk, they expressed interest in meeting with you, would you be able to set aside time? And I'd say, you know, a good majority of folks, of course everyone's busy, a lot of other things are going on, but I would say, you know, a good majority of folks, set aside time and it's, you know, a thank you to those of those scientists who did set aside time to talk about their science. And in many cases, they'd already heard about the talk and they were already planning to attend, and so that was very encouraging as well. So another component that was initially planned that did take place, were these ExoGuide talks. And so as a reminder, these ExoGuides were prominent Exoplanet scientists in the communities that we had selected before the program started, that would kind of act as mentors or direct interfaces to the ExoExplorers. And so they conducted essentially an hour long talk, followed by an hour long round table discussion with the ExoExplorers. And so this was an opportunity for them to kind of have a closed door discussion to really, you know, raise any issues they'd like to talk about and it sounds as though, we on the organizing committee and the steering committee were not involved in those round table discussions, so it was completely private, but it sounds as though, you know, lots of productive information and discussions took place there. So I hope that they got something out of it too. I'll say that all the ExoGuide talks, that first hour portion, are posted online. So, thank you to Ian Crossfield, to Vicky Meadows, to Courtney Dressing and Nicole Cologne for taking time off for doing this. Okay, let's see next on the list, the Professional Development workshops. So this was a component where, you know, we identified that the cohort would probably want to, you know, some sort of professional development, but we really didn't wanna dictate, you know, what workshops they'd taking. So we wanted to solicit from them what they were interested in and then coordinate speakers according to those topics. And so, the first, the two that were identified were Building Inclusive Collaborations. I think that's again, especially pertinent. And so in May 2021, we organized a talk and discussion with Stefanie Johnson, who's at CU Boulder. For those of you who may know her, she was key in acting on the Dual Anonymous Process for HST. And then second, they identified, you know, proposal writing is a key component that they would want to learn more about, I think for early career folks that's especially true and so actually later this week, Christina Richey from JPL will be conducting their usual, Proposal Writing Workshop, which probably many of you have taken on the line. So looking forward to that. Additionally, we had a meet and greet with the headquarters reps, Doug Hudgins, and Hannah Jang-Condell. So thank you for taking your time to just really, you know, talk about what headquarters folks do, how they get to headquarters and I think that's not something early career folks often learn about and so I think that was a valuable discussion and then finally, regular coffee and social interactions for the cohort. So we asked them, you know, what, especially what can we enable for you? And so, you know, we set aside this time and this kind of standing Webex essentially, for coffee and social hours that they could use as they see fit. We didn't have to join, we haven't joined. So it's really an opportunity for them to socialize with each other.

- [Jennifer] Hey Tiffany, you are half way through your time.

- Okay, great. I think that should be okay. So in terms of metrics, so this is a question that was raised in January, which I think was an excellent one you know, how are we going to measure the success of this program going forward? And so these are so far, you know, it's an initial list of metrics. I think we're building more, but at least for the first again, pilot cohort, we really wanted to aggregate as much information as we could. So kind of within the cohort, what sort of metrics can we set for them? And so at the beginning of the cohort, we sent them an anonymous survey to each of the ExoExplorers just to assess their own needs. You know, what are their goals for? What do they hope to get out of this program? And just, you know, assessing again their interest for participating in the professional development. And so, for those ExoExplorers on the line, expect an email from me, probably tomorrow with another survey. So this would be kind of a close-out survey that would serve to, you know, really assess, did you accomplish those goals that you set out at the beginning? And this survey I'll just mention also included an assessment for their mentoring networks. So this is a really helpful tool that I included the link for here just to, you know, assess what types of networks do you have and where can you, where can you build, but within the broader Exoplanet community, just including some initial metrics here so far. So we've of course been keeping track of the attendance rate for each of the set of ExoExplorer talks who've been, I'd say fairly highly attended and here, but here's some quantitative numbers here. So NExScl has been regularly tweeting out reminders of all the events and so, thanks to Marcy from NExScl, we have some actual quantitative numbers here. So for those in the social media realm, you know, the difference between impressions and engagement. So I linked those definitions here. But you can see that we have fairly high impressions and also total engagements and then of course, participation in the talks themselves. So, you know, at this point, as we're closing out the pilot cohorts, you know, we really look for any sort of feedback from you in the community, you know, ways in which we can improve the program, things you liked, things you didn't like. And so here's an anonymous feedback form where you can, you know, input any of your feedback, positive or negative, or somewhere in between and so here's a QR code also that you can scan. Again, this will all be online. So you can also find it there. And we're planning for the next cohort. I can officially say we're planning for January 2022 start date for the next cohort. And so the plan is for the call to be released in, sometime in August with a due date a month later, sometime in September and so selections in November, sorry, my computer just, okay, there we go. And so yeah, selections in November and different from the pilot program, we'll include an in-person component hooray. So of course, all of that is TBD, but we've at least secured some of the funding to be able to do that. But additionally, we're also looking for the next round of ExoGuides, these prominent Exoplanet scientists. And so, you know, within the organizing committee and the steering committee, we identified both folks, but, you know, we'd be remiss not to assess the community if you're particularly enthused about being an ExoGuide. So the form includes some, you know, kind of the general requirements, but if you have any questions, feel free to reach out to me or any of that folks on the organizing or steering committee side of things. And here's my last slide. So yeah, I just wanted to, you know, extend my thanks again to the Exoplanet Exploration Program Office, especially Gary Blackwood, David Ciardi, Eric Mamajek, Ray Lemus and Rebecca Gonzalez for getting a lot of the nitty gritty logistics on this. Off the ground, they know what I mean. The Exotags for their support, including Michael and of course Doug Hudgins and Hannah Jang-Condell for their support. Thanks obviously to the steering committee and the organizing committee for their work in getting this off the ground. And finally, you know, thanks to all of you for participating and for engaging in this program. We really want to make this bigger, better, and you know, as as many cohorts as we can have. And so yeah, we're looking forward to any feedback that you have. Any questions, there's a email link, and then you can sign up for the announcements there at the link below. All right, with that, I'll take any questions.

- Thanks very much, Tiffany and thank you and all the people you've listed for this great initiative, this important work that you're doing on all our barbie hearts. So thank you. I'm gonna ask one question cause I remember it came up last January. The participation is limited to U.S. citizens and or people who are at U.S. institutions, can you comment a little bit about that on efforts to expand the cohort eligibility?

- Sure. Yeah, absolutely. That's a great question. And that's something that we were actually just discussing this week. And so, we are certainly entertaining the idea of including international folks into the next and future cohorts. I think it would be a question mainly of logistics, but we haven't yet kind of had the more detailed discussions of how we would get that off the ground. But I will say, that in talking with Gary that, that the money issue would not be an issue. So for the thousand dollar compensation that the U.S. folks were compensated for their talk, I think the same could be extended to those international folks as well. So that shouldn't, in principle be a barrier. Yes. Thank you, Gary. But yeah, I'd say it's just a question of logistics, so far.

- All right, great. And you've provided lots of ways for people to send you feedback. So we're also grateful for those links and opportunities and the slides will be available online if they're not already.