The GCC 2013 Executive Committee is pleased to announce that the keynote address at this year’s conference will be given by Caroline Ummenhofer of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. Caroline will be speaking about her experiences with the transition from being a graduate student to holding a faculty position, as well as communicating climate science to external audiences.

Caroline Ummenhofer received a Joint Honours B.Sc. in Marine Biology and Physical Oceanography from the University of Wales, Bangor, UK, and a PhD in Applied Mathematics, specializing in climate modeling, from The University of New South Wales (UNSW), Sydney, Australia. Her PhD thesis received the Uwe Radok Award in ocean/atmosphere/climate science by the Australian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society. Caroline was a Postdoctoral Fellow at the ARC Centre of Excellence for Mathematics and Statistics of Complex Systems, held a Vice-Chancellor Postdoctoral Fellowship at UNSW, and was a Visiting Fellow with CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research in Hobart, Australia. Since 2012, she is an Assistant Scientist in the Physical Oceanography Department at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Woods Hole, USA. Her research interests include interannual to decadal climate variability, the hydrological cycle, monsoon dynamics, ocean-atmosphere interactions, droughts, extratropical climate, hydroclimate paleo reconstructions of the last millennium, and the effects of climate variability and change on agriculture. In particular, her research focuses on Indian Ocean dynamics, its variability and role for regional rainfall variations and droughts in the surrounding countries, spanning from seasonal to decadal timescales. Her research on the importance of a re-occurring Indian Ocean temperature pattern for Australian rainfall was awarded the prestigious 2008 Land & Water Australia Eureka Prize for Water Research and Innovation and is meanwhile routinely used by the Department of Agriculture and Food in Western Australia as one of five key indicators of growing season rainfall for farmers. A key goal of Caroline’s research has been to bridge the gap between ocean and climate dynamics and its impacts on end users. As such, she aims to provide practical outcomes of use to stakeholders in the agriculture and water management sectors, interacting with media, farmers’ organizations, and the broader public.

The application deadline for the 2013 Graduate Climate Conference has now passed. We’re pleased to announce a significant growth in interest for this year’s conference – there are many very interesting abstracts representing a huge swath of science and policy which we look forward to reading!

We hope to notify applicants of their acceptance by mid-July. In the meantime, check back often for details on this year’s conference, including information on accommodations in Woods Hole, post-conference activities on the Cape and in Boston, as well as the program/sessions we’ve structured based on your applications and research interests.

Applications are now open for participation in the 2013 Graduate Climate Conference!  Invitations to participate will be awarded on a competitive basis, as will limited travel funding.  The application is open to graduate students, and to undergrads who will be in their junior or senior year as of Fall 2013.  Applications will remain open through June 7.

To apply to the conference, please fill out the form at this link:
GCC 2013 Application

The GCC 2013 organizing committee is pleased to announce that the 7th annual Graduate Climate Conference will be held from November 1-3, 2013.  The Graduate Climate Conference is a climate research conference organized and held by graduate students, for graduate students.  This conference is designed to allow young research scientists to share their research with peers from diverse areas of the climate research community.  At the conference, students will establish connections with, learn from, and socialize with other young scientists from various institutions across the country and around the world.