Speaker
Describe the scientific/technical community and the scientific/technical activity using (planning to use) the EGEE infrastructure. A high-level description is needed (neither a detailed specialist report nor a list of references).
Three organizations that comprise the Alliance for Equity in Higher Education (AEHE) -- American Indian Higher Education Consortium (AIHEC), the Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities (HACU), National Association for Equal Opportunity in Higher Education (NAFEO), have established the Minority Serving Institutions (MSI)-Cyberinfrastructure (CI) Empowerment Coalition (MSI-CIEC). Coalition will foster CI-enabled distributed education and research network providing e-science education
Describe the added value of the Grid for the scientific/technical activity you (plan to) do on the Grid. This should include the scale of the activity and of the potential user community and the relevance for other scientific or business applications
Based in large part on lessons learned from the MSI CI Institute pilot project (NSF project #0537498), MSI-CIEC will provide the “human middleware” – the social and technological mechanisms facilitating the necessary communication and support linkages between MSI faculty and students, and researchers associated with e-science and CI initiatives. This will ensure that MSI institutions emerge as full partners in the national CI-enabled research and education infrastructure. Specifically, the project will involve: Expansion of the coalition of CI leaders and MSIs and resources and expertise brought into the collaboration by such leaders in emerging CI as TeraGrid, SDSC, NCSA, TACC, RENCI, and leading e-scientists in computational biology at majority and minority institutions; Implementation of CI-supported collaborative research and education projects using e-Science and e-Learning within and across our respective communities.
Report on the experience (or the proposed activity). It would be very important to mention key services which are essential for the success of your activity on the EGEE infrastructure.
Through a novel collaboration of MSIs and key leaders in CI, this project provides a model for building the CI and e-science knowledge and skills of MSI faculty and growing an inclusive national CI-enabled research infrastructure. The project will advance the knowledge associated with building technology-mediated multi-institutional and cross ethnic research and educational collaborations critical for CI development. It provides the needed human “middleware” to foster CI-enabled MSI and Research I university research and education collaborations, accelerating the inclusion of MSIs and their students into the growing national CI activities while helping to prepare the current and next-generation scientists at MSIs to use, support, deploy, develop or use CI. It is designed to develop the MSI capacity to prepare underrepresented minority students for a future in CI-facilitated science and the knowledge-based economy.
