1. Prisca Cushman: Committee Chair (AAAC chair 2014-15) University of Minnesota.
2. Jim Buckley (AAAC through 2014) Washington University. Rotated off committee
3. Angela Olinto (AAAC chair 2015-2016) University of Chicago.
4. Todd Hoeksema (NAS SSB, AAS Committee on Astronomy and Public Policy) Stanford University.
5. James Lowenthal (AAS Committee on Astronomy and Public Policy) Smith College.
6. Representative from NAC Astrophysics Subcommittee
   1. Brad Peterson (2014) Ohio State University
   2. Chryssa Kouveliotou (2015) George Washington University
   3. Padi Boyd (2015-2016) NASA Goddard Space Flight Center.
7. Keivan Stassun (American Physical Society DAP) Vanderbilt University.
8. Ted Von Hippel. Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University

1. NSF AST Division (703-292-8820): Jim Ulvestad and Jim Neff (Data).
   1. For specific business related to the CAA OIR System Committee, please contact Vern Pankonin (vpankoni@nsf.gov).
   2. For specific business related to CORF meetings, contact Tom Gergely (tgergely@nsf.gov) or Glen Langston (glangsto@nsf.gov)
2. NSF Particle Astrophysics: Jim Whitmore, Jean Cottam
3. NASA Astrophysics: Paul Hertz, Linda Sparke, Hashima Hasan, Dan Evans
4. NASA Heliophysics: Arik Posner
5. NASA Planetary: Jonathan Rall
6. DOE Cosmic Frontier: Michael Cooke, Kathy Turner
7. AAAC: Christopher Davis (CHRDAVIS@nsf.gov) for issues relating to committee business, or Elizabeth Pentecost (epenteco@nsf.gov) for logistics relating to meetings, meeting dates, etc.
8. AAS: Joel Parriott
9. NRC (NAS): David Lang, James Lancaster

Over the last decade, budget pressures and a steep rise in the number of proposals have had an impact on researchers and funding agencies in the fields of Astronomy and Astrophysics. The decreasing success rate of individual proposals, a general decrease in funding levels in many agencies, and increased reviewer load has been a topic of concern within the community. Consequently, a working group has been formed under the auspices of AAAC, including representatives from CAS, CAA, AAS, and NAC, in consultation with representatives from the relevant divisions of NSF, DOE and NASA. Its purpose is to evaluate the effect of this changing environment on the health of the field, specifically addressing whether this will result in an unacceptable restrictions in the range of new scientific initiatives and negatively impact career choices of the most promising researchers. It is already creating an unsustainable load on reviewers and has led the agencies to consider solutions to the problem (such as reducing the frequency of solicitations or restricting the number of proposals per year). This working group will gather relevant demographic data in order to understand how the funding environment over the last 10 years has affected researchers and projects. Of particular concern is the balance between National Labs and Universities, and between individual researcher grants and large projects. We will compare funding models across agencies and determine appropriate metrics for evaluating success. This will allow us to provide data-driven projections of the impact of such trends in the future, as well as that of any proposed solutions.

The specific tasks are

• Identify the questions that can inform this decision.
• Data collection required to answer these questions.
  • What already exists at the agencies?
  • What trending plots are the most informative?
  • What other data must be collected and from where and how?
• Collect data and determine optimal format for presentation
• Disseminate results – either publically or to the agencies.

• Our draft interim report entitled Impact of Declining Proposal Success Rates on Scientific Productivity
• The report is also posted on the 11/15 AAAC agenda page
• Slides and Talks on the Proposal Pressures Working Group and Presentations of the Interim Report
• The AAAC 2015 March Report (Demographics is the last section)
• The 2014 AAAC Report Recommendations relevant to this study

• 2015: December 11 Teleconference on the survey Agenda
• 2015: Oct 9 Teleconference Agenda and Minutes
• 2015: Oct 2 Teleconference Agenda and Minutes
• 2015: July 9 Teleconference Agenda
• 2015: May 26 Teleconference Agenda and Minutes
• 2015: Apr 27 Teleconference Agenda and Minutes
• 2015: Apr 15 Teleconference Minutes
• 2015: Feb 18 Teleconference Agenda and Minutes
• 2015: Jan 14 Teleconference Agenda and Minutes
• 2014: Dec 19 Teleconference Agenda and Minutes
• 2014: Nov 7 Teleconference Agenda and Minutes
• 2014: Oct 23 Teleconference Agenda and Minutes
• 2014: Oct 3 Teleconference Agenda and Minutes
• 2014: July 15 Teleconference Minutes

Complete list of AAAC committee and interested parties

Committee members only

• Click here to leave digested comments on the Interim Report. This means ideas for improvement gleaned from our own discussions and from the comment pages or from our reports.
• New Survey Questions This is an active page and can be used to communicate your suggestions for the new Survey. Ted Von Hippel will be reviewing this page on a regular basis. For reference, the entire National Academies 2000 report webpage and more specifically chapter 4 on Demographics is very useful.
• Specific Agency Statistics This is an active page and can be used to request that the committee find specific answers to incomplete stats - those needed to support a particular point in our report.
• Brainstorming: The Questions Page This is an early attempt to gather information. It is largely historical and can provide ideas.
• Considering Solutions:This Page contains a compilation of possible solutions and a framework for organizing the data into specific recommendations.
• Agency-Specific pages. Each liaison will be editor of their page. Questions garnered from the Questions Page will be refined and data relevant to the specific division and agency will be posted here.
  • NASA Astrophysics Committee Liaison: Keivan Stassun, (Brad Peterson)
  • NASA Heliophysics Committee Liaison: Todd Hoeksema
  • NASA Planetary Committee Liaison: Jim Buckley
  • NSF Astronomy Committee Liaison: James Lowenthal
    • Slides from Dan Evans specific to NSF AST Demographics (also in Resources)
  • NSF Particle Astrophysics Committee Liaison: Angela Olinto
  • DOE Cosmic Frontier Committee Liaison: Prisca Cushman
  • AAS information and questions Liaisons: Todd Hoeksema, James Lowenthal

• Resources This is general information relevant to the process, including articles, links to policies, and resources such as the AAS database. Information from DOE, NSF, and NASA concerning data collection (including trending plots, etc) is found under the Agency Specific Pages.