Denise Hills Candidate Statement 2021

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Denise Hills, Program Director, Energy Investigations at Geological Survey of Alabama, Candidate for Vice President

It is an honor to have been nominated for the position of Vice President for ESIP. My involvement with ESIP goes back to 2012, when I virtually attended my first meeting and immediately felt welcomed into a community that truly is about Making Data Matter. Being "new" was no barrier to getting involved, as I was able to engage right away in various committees and clusters. Since the Geological Survey of Alabama became an ESIP member in 2013, I have been involved in several committees and working groups, including Data Stewardship (member, co-chair); Partnership (member); Governance (member, current chair); Visioneers (member, chair); Nominations (chair); Community Data (member); and many others. I’ve served in a variety of leadership positions outside of ESIP as well, including Geological Society of America (Chair, Geoinformatics Division); American Geophysical Union (President, Earth and Space Science Informations; Chair, Position Statement Committee; Member, Falkenberg Awards Committee); Parent Teacher Association (Local unit (school) officer; Council President; State Secretary; State VP of Programs); and Scouting USA (local unit leader; Black Warrior Council VP of Membership).

Being a part of ESIP has allowed me to grow in my career. I am an "accidental" informaticist, with little formal training. I am constantly learning more things that I don't know but I know that I can rely on ESIP to help me find the people I need to learn from and collaborate with in order to move geoscience data forward. ESIP is a community that embraces the value of Earth and space science data and works to make it more findable and accessible, more readily usable (e.g., interoperable) and reusable, while maintaining high ethical standards around privacy, openness, and giving appropriate credit.

A unique aspect of ESIP is just how much of the work is from the ground up. ESIP is very much a community, but one reason it functions so well is the light-weight and flexible governance in place. If I am elected as ESIP’s VP, I would serve with this in mind. The role of VP is to help implement the decisions of ESIP’s Board, to represent ESIP to the broader Earth and space science community, and to support the ESIP President. With my leadership experience in ESIP and other professional organizations I feel that I would fulfill those obligations in a manner that you, the community, would be proud of.

Thank you for your consideration. If you want more detail on my career and professional experience, please check out my CV [ http://bit.ly/2mHYUhq ] Please reach out to me if you have any questions about my vision for the ESIP VP.