Restructuring NASA's Planetary Research Program

Restructuring NASA’s Planetary Research Program For ROSES 2021
“In 2014, NASA announced the reorganization of the planetary research and data analysis programs to align them by subject area to Planetary Science Division strategic goals. A number of disparate programs were merged into the Solar System Workings program, creating a behemoth to which well over 300 proposals have been submitted each year. This has proved unwieldy for managers, reviewers, and proposers alike. A survey (Appendix A) shows it is supported by less than 10% of respondents. In this grass roots effort, we propose SSW be broken up into five core programsanda separate pilot program for geologic mapping. We propose a restructuring of mission data analysis programs with some guidelines for future programs. We would maintain most of the other existing programs. An initial draft of this proposal was posted online and an online community survey (Appendix A) was conducted from October 1-7, advertised through the Planetary Exploration Newsletter, AAS DPS Newsletter, and other community forums. This proposal is informed by the 249 responses to the survey including a large number of comments.”

Actually, no. NASA has no plans to restructure the research and analysis program. Mark Sykes, the president of Planetary Science Institute wants them to do so in a particular way, and he’s lobbying in favor of that change. To that end, he wrote up the idea, conducted a fundamentally flawed survey himself and and now requested “Public Comments”. By the way, the comment period, start to end, is only three days (one of which is a Saturday. As far as I can tell, was only advertised through his own “Planetary Exploration Newsletter”, and then only on the first day of the comment period. It’s also worth noting that one of the main sources of income for his company, PSI, is the NASA grants awarded through the research and analysis program.

Since I called his survey “fundamentally flawed”, I should probably say why. First, he’s doing itself, which almost inevitably means it will get a biased result. That’s because the proponent of an idea will, consciously or unconsciously, do some of the things a meaningful survey needs to avoid. For example:

He introduced his survey by saying current system “a behemoth to which well over 300 proposals have been submitted each year. This proved unwealdy [sic] for managers, reviewers, and proposers alike.” And then imply the proposed changes would fix the problem. That’s opinion, in the case of how managers, reviewers and proposers feel about it, not really true. That sort of phrasing biases the people talking the survey.

The main question was whether or not people supported the proposed re-restructuring. It wasn’t actually phrased as question, just a statement of what they proposed. That’s not a good way to do things. Worse, respondents were a set list of responses. That ought to be written in clear and non-colloquial language. But the list certainly shouldn’t herd people into certain responses. The options were, “Looks good”, “Mostly good, I have a few suggestions”, and “Keep SSW and everything else as is.” So what about people who are less favorable than “Mostly good” but don’t think the SSW (Solar System Workings) part of the program is perfect?

The survey was only open for a week, starting on the day it was announced. Despite their statements to the contrary, it was not widely advertised. I say it in their PEN newsletter, and the Division of Planetary Sciences newsletter was also mentioned (I don’t subscribe to that one.) I do get the American Geophysical Union’s Planetary Science Section newsletter and the Lunar and Planetary Institute’s Planetary News emails. Those would have been appropriate, but the survey wasn’t mentioned in them. Combined with the fact that it’s a survey where people who participate are self-selected, it’s very unlikely if the respondents were representative of the planetary science community.

As far as Solar System Workings and the research and analysis program in general, I think it could be better. But it could also be worse. When a bunch of smaller programs were merged into SSW, things were pretty chaotic for a couple years. And it was unwieldy until people figured out how to make the review process for a big program work smoothly. But that’s mostly straightened itself out. The current structure does have a number of advantages over the old one. There are probably ways to improve it, but not (in my opinion) they way Dr. Sykes is suggesting, and it probably wouldn’t be worth going through the few years of chaos a re-restructuring would probably produce.

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One reply on “Restructuring NASA's Planetary Research Program”

fcrary says:

October 12, 2019 at 8:13 pm

Actually, no. NASA has no plans to restructure the research and analysis program. Mark Sykes, the president of Planetary Science Institute wants them to do so in a particular way, and he’s lobbying in favor of that change. To that end, he wrote up the idea, conducted a fundamentally flawed survey himself and and now requested “Public Comments”. By the way, the comment period, start to end, is only three days (one of which is a Saturday. As far as I can tell, was only advertised through his own “Planetary Exploration Newsletter”, and then only on the first day of the comment period. It’s also worth noting that one of the main sources of income for his company, PSI, is the NASA grants awarded through the research and analysis program.

Since I called his survey “fundamentally flawed”, I should probably say why. First, he’s doing itself, which almost inevitably means it will get a biased result. That’s because the proponent of an idea will, consciously or unconsciously, do some of the things a meaningful survey needs to avoid. For example:

He introduced his survey by saying current system “a behemoth to which well over 300 proposals have been submitted each year. This proved unwealdy [sic] for managers, reviewers, and proposers alike.” And then imply the proposed changes would fix the problem. That’s opinion, in the case of how managers, reviewers and proposers feel about it, not really true. That sort of phrasing biases the people talking the survey.

The main question was whether or not people supported the proposed re-restructuring. It wasn’t actually phrased as question, just a statement of what they proposed. That’s not a good way to do things. Worse, respondents were a set list of responses. That ought to be written in clear and non-colloquial language. But the list certainly shouldn’t herd people into certain responses. The options were, “Looks good”, “Mostly good, I have a few suggestions”, and “Keep SSW and everything else as is.” So what about people who are less favorable than “Mostly good” but don’t think the SSW (Solar System Workings) part of the program is perfect?

The survey was only open for a week, starting on the day it was announced. Despite their statements to the contrary, it was not widely advertised. I say it in their PEN newsletter, and the Division of Planetary Sciences newsletter was also mentioned (I don’t subscribe to that one.) I do get the American Geophysical Union’s Planetary Science Section newsletter and the Lunar and Planetary Institute’s Planetary News emails. Those would have been appropriate, but the survey wasn’t mentioned in them. Combined with the fact that it’s a survey where people who participate are self-selected, it’s very unlikely if the respondents were representative of the planetary science community.

As far as Solar System Workings and the research and analysis program in general, I think it could be better. But it could also be worse. When a bunch of smaller programs were merged into SSW, things were pretty chaotic for a couple years. And it was unwieldy until people figured out how to make the review process for a big program work smoothly. But that’s mostly straightened itself out. The current structure does have a number of advantages over the old one. There are probably ways to improve it, but not (in my opinion) they way Dr. Sykes is suggesting, and it probably wouldn’t be worth going through the few years of chaos a re-restructuring would probably produce.