Keith’s note: I had planned on listening in on the NASA Advisory Council’s Education and Public Outreach Subcommittee meeting today via Webex. But I changed my mind and decided that it would be a waste of time – time better spent on doing real work (and cleaning out my garage). I am not sure that what the NAC or any of its subcommittees does or says actually matters in any significant way. NASA clearly ignores them. The NAC is actually rather passive (more so than ever in the past) and never actually says anything strategic or insightful. And they never, ever push NASA hard on the things that are clearly screwed up. Indeed, all the NACsters ever say is “nice job”, “what would you do with a bigger budget?”, “thanks for taking time out of your busy schedule to visit with us”, or “there’s a typo on your chart”. Check the calendar on the right for their other meetings over the coming days. Or not. Yawn.
Keith’s update: Let me add that the new NAC Chair, Steve Squyres should be a breath of fresh air. He is an explorer’s explorer and, contrary to a lot of NAC members, he does not dwell behind a desk or reflexively seek a TV camera. Instead he goes to remote and dangerous places to explore and to make sure that the Mars rovers that he helps to build will be able to do their job. Whether he can inpsire his fellow NACsters to show a little spine and advise NASA in a more pointed and strategic fashion remains to be seen. I wish him luck.
That’s a somewhat unfair characterization of what the NAC always does, and ignores it’s true function. What is does is not what happens at the meetings.
The NAC meetings are like meetings of the Board of Directors of a corporation, except in the case of the NAC, the administrator chooses these people. That Board will never say anything publicly that will damage the brand. But there will be a lot of back-room give and take (FACA apropos) that will help guide the organization. You need to understand how advisory committees work.
The primary purpose of the NAC is as an independent (as in, not NASA civil servant) sounding board for the Administrator. They can offer “smell tests” on agency policy, and they can give the Administrator confidence that his implementations of administration policies are sound. Conversely, they give assurance to the industry and science communities that their voices are being heard at the highest level.
I agree completely that the NAC meetings are largely a waste of time for those people not on the NAC. Those meetings just serve to gently rubber stamp and formalize ideas that are being considered by the organization. Should a red flag be waved, it probably will be waved outside of these meetings such that, by the time the topic is brought up at the meeting, the NAC will have something to say “nice job” about. You won’t hear “strategic or insightful” things at the meetings, because that’s not the forum for strategy or insight.
So how does this kind of structure be consistent with FACA? Pretty easy. The Administrator can’t say “I did this, because they ADVISED me to do so” unless that advice was given in a FACA compliant way. But the Administrator can do those things without pointing his finger at the NAC, instead just noting that the NAC approved of “his” plans. The NAC will generously allow him to do this.
I attended today’s event. I may write something about it in the next few days. It was mildly interesting. I managed to make a point as a member of the public.
With all due respect to Steve Squyres who, like his predecessors on the NAC, will bring insight and expertise, his involvement on NEEMO hardly qualifies him for this job. NEEMO is a nice facility, but the relevance to human space flight is arguable, and it’s hardly a dangerous place (a whole 60 feet deep), nor is it really all that remote (a few miles off Key Largo). He could swim back to shore if he had to. Steve’s excellent leadership with the MER project is nice, as many other science mission PIs show as well. Steve is, however, hardly an expert at business management, corporate machinations or advanced technology, so the NAC will have to look elsewhere for that kind of valuable leadership. As to inspiring spine, again, that’s not what he’s there to do, and inspiration of the kind of spine that you’re looking for could well get him thrown off the NAC. That kind of thing has happened, of course. Oh yes, Steve really likes TV cameras, but fortunately doesn’t it go to his head.