The
seminars listed below can be given upon request.
Professional
Development Workshops and Seminars
Workshop: Research skills for graduate graduate
students, postdocs, and other junior researchers
Research
is an activity that must be learned. In this workshop we cover
skills needed to be effective in a research career. These
skills include the following:
How to
choose a research topic and an adviser
Using
questions to drive research
Goals
setting
Challenges
and opportunities in the practice of science
Research
ethics
Using
the scientific literature
Oral
and written communication
Publishing
papers
Time
management
Writing
proposals
The
scientific career
Applying
for a job
In this interactive workshops we choose from the
topics above based on the interest of the audience. I
teach this material in different forms; as a semester-long
course, as a short course of a few afternoons, or as a single
one-hour seminar.
The book The
Art of Being a Scientist, that covers most of this
material is available from Cambridge University Press.
Title:
Teaching and Advising with Heart
The students that we educate in
science and engineering go out into the world, bringing
their energy and skills to the development of new
creations. Since we are working with young people in the
formative years of their professional and personal
development, and since the state of wellness of college
students is worrisome, we need to ask ourselves the
question how do we prepare our graduate students at a
personal level for their future? I discuss the
importance of educating and advising students as whole
students, and present simple steps, that are not
time-consuming, that help create a learning environment
where we assist students in their personal growth and
wellbeing. This amounts to Teaching with Heart,
a mindset aimed at seeing the full person in students,
facilitating the growth of an integrated personality,
and showing up as teachers and advising with an attitude
of care. In advising graduate students this includes
identifying their challenges and reorienting these as a
growth opportunity. And when we do this, we don't just
foster the growth of better people, we grow better
scientists and engineers too!
Title: Professional development education for graduate
students and other young academics
The current model for training researchers is very
much like the medieval system where an apprentice follows a
master for years of training. This model gives graduate
students valuable hands-on experience. What often lacks in
this educational model is an explicit transfer of skills and
information at a rate and moment in time that is effective
for acquiring research skills in a timely manner. This
contains practical skills for doing research (e.g.,
choosing a research topic, what to do when being stuck, oral
and written communication) as well as skills that are needed
for a successful professional career (such as negotiation,
teamwork, time management, ethics). This material can be
delivered through a combination of courses and workshops. In
this seminar I present examples of the delivery of material
and share best practices for delivering professional
development education.
Title:
Professional development education of science and engineering
students
Much of the education of scientists and engineers focuses on
disciplinary skills. These skills are essential, but there are
many reasons why these disciplinary skills needs to be
complemented with a broader skill set. In almost any type of
work that scientists or engineers do, written and oral
communication is essential. Since science and engineering are
not value-free, it is important that students develop a moral
compass that guides them in their career. (In fact, the
National Science Foundation mandates ethics training for
students that are supported by the NSF.) Lastly, the state of
mental health of students gives reasons for concern, and it is
important that we offer students adequate tools for
self-management and wellbeing. I will present the approach
taken at the Colorado School of Mines for expanding the
education of scientists and engineers beyond disciplinary
skills, and the opportunities and impediments encountered in
developing and implementing this broadening of the education
offered.
Title:
Teaching with a Heart
The students that we educate in science and engineering go out
into the world, bringing their energy and skills to the
development of new creations. Since we are working with young
people in the formative years of their professional and
personal development, and since the state of wellness of
college students is worrisome, we need to ask ourselves the
question how do we prepare our students at a personal level
for their future? I discuss the importance of educating
students as whole students, and present simple steps, that are
not time-consuming, that help create a learning environment
where we assist students in their personal growth and
wellbeing. This amounts to Teaching with a Heart, a mindset
aimed at seeing the full person in students, facilitating the
growth of an integrated personality, and showing up as
teachers with an attitude of care. And when we do this, we
don't just foster the growth of better people, we grow better
engineers too!
Title: The
Forgotten Dimension of Teacher Preparation: Teaching with a
Heart
Description: Traditional teacher
preparation for higher education consist of two
elements: course design and pedagogy. These elements
cover the formulation of outcomes, assessment,
material to be used and delivered, the method of
delivery, and providing useful feedback. These
elements are important, but they leave out an
important aspect of being a teacher in higher
education, do we truly care about our students? The
attitude with which we show up in the classroom is
largely shaped by our beliefs about teaching, about
our students, and about ourselves. A key question
whether we bring our heart to the classroom? In order
to explore this third dimension of teaching we have
started the Teaching
with Heart project, which is funded by the John Templeton
Foundation. In this session we will dive into
the importance of assessing, and possibly reframing,
our beliefs about our role as teachers. We will also
cover actions that teachers can take to create a more
caring classroom environment.
Title: Wellbeing of the modern researcher
We
live in an age where working in science or engineering offers
tremendous professional opportunities--the pace and progress
of scientific development is truly breathtaking. Yet many
researchers in the sciences, social sciences, and engineering
struggle with the pressures of the fast-paced academic
workplace, and struggle to harmonize their work lives with
their personal lives. In this conversational and interactive
seminar we will examine some of the attitudes, beliefs, and
habits that influence the way we give shape to our career and
that affect our wellbeing.
Workshop for graduate students: Working with your Adviser
In this
workshop for graduate students we cover the opportunities
and pitfalls in working with your advisor. There is no such
thing as the "generic advisor." Different advisors have
different styles, and different students have different
needs. We cover the different supervision styles and how
these might serve the needs of different students. A
positive work relation between graduate students and their
advisors is essential, and it is important that expectations
between student and advisor are matched. We will discuss
these expectations--what is reasonable and what is not--and
provide a tool that helps streamline the collaboration
between student and advisor. Lastly we will cover options a
student has when the collaboration with an advisor does not
go well.
Workshop: Effective Negotiation Skills
Negotiation is an integral part of professional life.
Negotiating a job contract is one of the first things we do
(hopefully) when leaving school. While in graduate school,
or on the job, numerous occasions arise where we need to
negotiate, and it is important that we can stand up for our
interest by effective negotiation. Yet many of us are not
comfortable negotiating, or don't know how to negotiate. In
this workshop we explore internal barriers we may face
to enter a negotiation. We will cover the basics of
negotiation, which involve knowing what you want or need,
and conversation methods that encourage the other party to
move towards your needs while maintaining a positive
dialogue. Lastly we discuss simple practices that help you
become more comfortable with negotiation.
Workshop:
Managing activities for managing time
Abstract: Do
you wish there was a 25th hour in the day, or an
8th day in the week? Many of us are so busy that
we have a strong sense of not being able to get
things "done." In this workshop we cover steps
that may alleviate the pressure we feel of there
not being enough time. We cover a tool to
analyze how to prioritize our time and make wise
choices, we discuss why many of us take on too
much, and why we may find it difficult to say
"no" to new activities. We also discuss a number
of tangible steps that help manage our
activities while making us more productive in
our work.
Workshop:
Driving research by creatively asking questions
Abstract:
Questions are the prime driver of research because they are
invitations to answers. Knowing the main questions to
be addressed for a research project is usually not enough
because the main question often is too broad to lead to
specific actions. In this seminar we discuss the importance
of questions in research, different ways to generate
research questions, and ways to order questions
so that they naturally lead to a workplan for research.
Workshop:
How to (Not) Give a Truly Terrible Talk
Did you
ever listen to a presentation that was poorly delivered,
where you felt you were wasting your time? It happens, and
when it does, you don't want to be the speaker doing the
delivery. In this workshop we will compare the same talk
when presented in two different ways and use this comparison
to get clarity on the do's and dont's of oral presentations.
After attending this workshop you know the importance of
telling--and repeating--a story, the basics of effective use
and design of slides, and how to use your voice and body for
a compelling delivery.
Workshop:
Writing your first paper
Writing
is hard, writing the first paper is often a tough
experience for students and advisors. In this interactive
seminar we explore habits that ease the process of writing
the first research paper and that can be a huge time-saver
for students and advisors These steps include deciding on
the content, audience, and journal before you start
writing, receiving and incorporating feedback on parts of
the manuscript, common mistakes, and taking advantage of
resources.
Workshop:
Identifying and choosing the right research topic
Choosing the right research topic in one of the most
important steps in research, yet this is the aspect of
research that we sometimes pay little attention to.
There is, of course, no algorithm for picking the right
research topic, and the concept of a perfect topic can
be poorly defined. In this workshop we explore the
process for indentifying good research topics and the
many considerations that go into choosing a research
topic.
Workshop:
Prototyping ideas quickly
The ability to swiftly prototype ideas, discern their
viability, and pivot with agility is a critical skills
for resedarch, both in an academic and in an industrial
environment. Learn techniques to prototype ideas
quickly, efficiently assess their potential, and make
informed decisions on whether to iterate or move on.
Workshop:
Teamwork and How to Combine our Talents
Good
teamwork is more than just combining forces so we can get
more work done. Good teams consist of members with diverse
skills and characters, and their members know how to exploit
this diversity by turning it into a strength instead of a
weakness. Doing so requires an intentional effort because
differences in team members can lead to disfunction when not
handled properly. In addition, intelligent people of good
will often do stupid things when working in a group (the
stupidity paradox). In this workshops we discuss
opportunities and challenges in teamwork, and give
participants insights in their strength and weaknesses while
working on a team.
Workshop:
Conflict resolution
Despite our best intentions conflicts do occur. In fact,
conflicts sometimes arise and grow because our reluctance or
inability to have a "difficult" conversation at an early
stage before it festers and then erupts into a conflict. In
practice, conflicts develop according to a repeatable and
predictable pattern. In this workshop we discuss this
pattern using a conflict between a graduate student and
advisor as an example. Perhaps more importantly, we discuss
how during every step of the escalation the conflict might
have been de-escalated, when the help of others is needed,
and what form that help might take.
Title:
Value-Based Ethics and the Moral Compass; from Preaching and
Teaching to Reaching
Professional
ethics education in science and engineering is often based
either on telling students what proper ethical principles
are (e.g., professional codes of ethics) and/or by teaching
the philosophical theories of ethics. Although there is a
value and purpose for both types of teaching ethics, these
approaches alone are not effective to bring about ethical
engagement and behavioral change unless the materials are
embraced and internalized by students. Instead, we propose
that effective ethics teaching includes connecting to the
personal values of students. But often we are not aware what
our values really are; we need to reach out to them. We will
explore the concept of values, and do an exercise to help us
get clarity on what our values are. We will then explore how
these values might shape the daily professional practice of
scientists or engineers.
Title:
Ten ethical questions for scientists and engineers
Science and engineering in the broadest sense not
only help us better understand the world in which we live;
these fields also increase the power that we hold over the
world. Unfortunately, neither science nor engineering comes
with a recipe how to use that power. This idea is captured
by the writer Goswani* who states that "Creativity unguided
is a two-edged sword. It can be used to enhance the ego at
the expense of civilization. One must apply creativity with
wisdom." Helping students grow the wisdom how to use science
and engineering responsibly is one of the goals of teaching
ethics. In addition, students benefit from learning how to
make ethical decisions in the daily practice of science.
Ethics training is now mandated by the National Science
Foundation for all students and postdocs that are supported
by this organization. In response to this requirement, the
Colorado School of Mines has developed the graduate course
"Introduction to Research Ethics" (SYGN502).
* Goswani, A., The self-aware universe, Penguin
Putnam Inc., New York, 1995.
Title:
Diversity in the research environment
The
modern research environment is increasingly diverse. This is
partly due to increased globalization, but within the United
States and Europe this is also due to a change in the
demographics. This increased diversity poses challenges and
opportunities for optimally collaborating and communicating.
The increasing international diversity of research groups
is, unfortunately, not accompanied by an increased
participation of US minorities in research. I present some
of the roadblocks that hamper an increased diversity in
research that include lack of knowledge or appreciation of
other cultures, deeply ingrained prejudices, fear, social
inequality, and perhaps most importantly, an inability to
see and appreciate our common humanity. Identifying these
impediments may help remove or overcome them, so that we can
take advantage of the cultural and intellectual enrichment
of a diverse research environment.
Title: Teaching the class "Science and Spirituality" to
college students
At many
universities, conversations about spirituality are relegated
to the personal realm. Yet, there is a deep need among
some students to have conversations about spirituality
in the environment where these students also learn
disciplinary skills. This has led to the development of the
undergraduate class "Science and Spirituality" at the
Colorado School of Mines. This class is a mix of historical,
scientific, and spiritual perspectives and includes
experiential exercises. Instead of striking an intellectual
or academic tone, the class is aimed at providing a rich
personal experience. Students appreciate the opportunity to
dive into the subject with fellow students. The topic has
the potential to lead to controversial encounters, therefore
setting the right tone--based on dialogue and respect--as
well as building trust in the class, is an essential part of
teaching this topic. In this seminar I will present the
scope of the class, my experience of teaching this class, a
set of best practices, and an example of class activities.
Technical
Seminars
Title:
Variations and
healing of the seismic velocity
Interferometric methods in seismology have made it possible
to detect time-lapse changes in the seismic velocity with an
accuracy of about 0.1%. I will show examples of detecting
velocity changes in the laboratory, the earth's near
surface, and in engineered structures. Perhaps surprisingly,
the seismic velocity is not constant at all, and varies with
the seasons, temperature, precipitation, as the weather
does. In addition, the seismic velocity usually drops as a
result of deformation. Most of these changes likely occur in
the near surface or the region of deformation, and a
drawback of using strongly scattered waves is that it is
difficult to localize the spatial area of the velocity
change. I will present laboratory measurements that show
that a certain spatial localization of the velocity change
can be achieved. One of the intriguing observations is that
after deformation the seismic velocity recovers
logarithmically with time.The reason for this particular time-dependence is the
presence of healing mechanisms that operate at different
time scales. Since this is feature of many physical systems,
the logarithmic healing is a widespread behavior and is akin
in its generality to the Gutenberg-Richter law.
Title:
Focusing waves in unknown media
In
many applications, such as imaging, one needs to focus
wavefields. In general one needs to know
the medium to focus waves, and limitations
on the properties of the medium can hamper adequate
focusing. In this presentation I show a method to focus
waves in an unknown medium. The method is based on inverse
scattering methods as originally developed in quantum
mechanics. I show, using simple examples, that the so-called
Marchenko equation provides the Green's functions that
accounts for the wave propagation from the acquisition
surface to any arbitrary point in the medium. These Green's
functions account for the wave propagation in the unknown
medium and can directly be used to focus or image waves.
Tutorial:
seismic interferometry, who needs a seismic source?
Seismic
interferometry is a technique for imaging without coherent
sources. The idea is to combine waveforms, generated by
ambient noise, that are recorded at different receivers in a
way to provide the waves that would propagate between these
receivers as if there was a source at one of these receivers.
This obviates the need to have a soure located at one of the
receivers. In the tutorial I cover different formulations of
the theory that explain seismic interferometry, and present
examples with field data that show the possibilities that are
opened up with this new technique. With the advent of
permanent networks of seismometers in exploration seismology
and global seismology, seismic interferometry opens up new
methods for imaging and time-lapse monitoring.
Title: Extraction of the Green's function from
ambient fluctuations for general linear systems
The
extraction of the Green's function of acoustic and elastic
waves from ambient fluctuations is by now a technique that is
theoretical well-described and that has succesfully been
used in different applications. I show theoretically that the
principle of the extraction of the Green's function can be
generalized to a wide class of linear systems. These new
applications include the diffusion equation, Maxwell's
equations, a vibrating beam, and the Schroedinger
equation. For systems that are invariant for
time-reversal it suffices to have sources of ambient
fluctuations on a surface that bounds the region of interest.
When the invariance for time-reversal is broken, as for
example in the case of the diffusion equation or for wave
propagation in attenuating media, one also needs sources of
ambient fluctuations throught the volume. This work
opens up new opportunities to extract the Green's function
from ambient fluctuations that include electromagnetic fields
in conducting media, flow in porous media, wave propagation in
attenuating media, monitoring of mechanical structures, and
quantum mechanics.
Title:
Extracting the building response from incoherent waves
Structures
such as buildings or bridges are often instrumented with
accelerometers to monitor the vibrations. Since the excitation
of these structures usually is incoherent, these recordings do
not directly give the impulse response (the response to an
impulsive loading) of these structures. I show how seismic
interferometry can be used to extract the impulse response
from a building from incoherent vibrations recorded in a
building after an earthquake. I also show that depending on
the data-processing that is applied, either the propagating
waves or the normal modes of the buliding can be retrieved.
With this apprach the response of the building can be
separated from the coupling of the building to the subsurface.
In this seminar I show the theory and apply this to the motion
recorded in the Millikan Libary in Pasadena (California).
Title:
Coda Wave Interferometry
Multiple
scattered waves are not very useful for deterministic imaging
in complicated media because there is no known algorithm to
construct such an image. Because multiple scattered waves have
long wave-paths, these waves are very sensitive to small
changes in the medium. Coda wave interferometry is a new
technique that can be used to detect minute changes in a
strongly scattering medium using changes in the multiple
scattered waves over time. This technique is analogous to
speckle pattern interferometry as used in optics, but takes
advantage of the phase information in recorded waves. Because
of its modest hardware requirements, coda wave interometry has
a large number of applications. These include geotechnical
applications (dam-monitoring, tunnel monitoring), the
evaluation of hazards (volcano and fault monitoring),
non-destructive testing, locating earthquakes, and monitoring
of hydrocarbon reservoirs.
Title:
Time-reversed imaging as a diagnostic of wave and particle
chaos
Chaotic
behaviour of particles concerns the stability properties of
trajectories under perturbations of initial conditions. For
waves, chaotic behaviour is less clearly defined. Both
Newton's law and the Helmholtz equation are symmetric under
time-reversal. This means that particles or waves emitted by a
source at t=0 should refocus on the source when their
propagation is reversed in time. Chaotic behaviour will
prevent this to occur. This idea is tested for a system of
very strong scatterers through which particles and wave
propagate. Analytical expressions are derived for the critical
perturbations of the initial conditions of both waves and
particles. It is shown that the resulting behaviour of waves
and particles are fundamentally different with critical length
scales ranging over 15 orders of magnitude. The analytical
results are illustrated and confirmed by numerical
simulations.
Talks for a
General Audience
Title: Hydraulic
fracturing, a tale of two continents
Hydraulic
fracturing has recently revolutionized oil and gas production.
The public concerns about this technique are significant, to an
extent that limits the use of hydraulic fracturing in many
regions. In this presentation I discuss these concerns and show
that the societal response to hydraulic fracturing in North
America and Europe is very different. But one can argue that on
both continents the democratic decision-making process is broken
down, albeit for different reasons. The result of this breakdown
is that we are not asking ourselves the tough questions that we
ought to ask ourselves. This is a presentation is for the
non-specialist.
Title: Facing the
main challenges in Carbon Capture and Sequestration
Capturing CO2 and
injecting it in the subsurface is often seen as the main tool to
prevent man-made global warming. The following questions must be
answered before this process can be used on a scale that
actually makes a difference in preventing climate change. (1)
How can the cost of this process be reduced from its projected
cost of 150 billion dollars per year? (2) How can this the
capture and injection be up-scaled with a factor 1000 beyond
current capabilities? (3) How can we predict and monitor
leakage? Many action alternative to carbon capture and
sequestration likely to be much cheaper and save energy as well.
Title:
Carbon Capture and Sequestration; Panacea or Indulgence?
Current
events show that climate change is upon us. The mechanism of
global warming was already explained fairly accurately by
Arrhenius in 1896. An alternative to reducing greenhouse gas
emissions by burning less fossil fuels is to capture CO2 and
then store it in the subsurface. This technology relies on our
expertise in injecting fluids in the subsurface and to monitor
the fluids and their fate in the subsurface. In the geophysics
community this technology has been presented as "a well accepted
leading mitigation strategy against climate change" (The Leading
Edge, 20, 224, 2021). In order to understand to what extent this
optimism is warranted one needs to consider the following
factors: (1) the amount of CO2 that needs to be captured and
sequestered to have a significant impact on climate change, (2)
the cost of CO2 capture and sequestration compared with other
technologies for avoiding CO2 emissions, (3) the reason why CO2
capture is expensive and energy-intensive, and (4) the extreme
accuracy with which CO2 in the subsurface needs to be monitored.
As with many complicated problems, the devil is in the details,
and we need to understand these details to assess the impact of
carbon capture and storage that can be expected.
Biographical
sketch
Roel
Snieder holds the W.M. Keck Distinguished Chair of
Professional Development Education at the Colorado School of
Mines. He received in 1984 a Masters degree in Geophysical
Fluid Dynamics from Princeton University, and in 1987 a Ph.D.
in seismology from Utrecht University. In 1993 he was
appointed as professor of seismology at Utrecht University,
where from 1997-2000 he served as Dean of the Faculty of Earth
Sciences. Roel served on the editorial boards of
Geophysical Journal International, Inverse Problems, Reviews
of Geophysics, the Journal of the Acoustical Society of
America, and the European Journal of Physics. In 2000 he was
elected as Fellow of the American Geophysical Union. He isauthor of the textbooks "A Guided Tour of Mathematical Methods
for the Physical Sciences", "The
Art of Being a Scientist", and "The
Joy of Science" that are published by Cambridge
University Press. In 2011 he was elected as Honorary Member of
the Society of Exploration Geophysicists, and in 2014 he
received a research award from the Alexander von Humboldt
Foundation. In 2016 Roel received the Beno Gutenberg Medal
from the European Geophysical Union and the Outstanding
Educator Award from the Society of Exploration Geophysicists.
He received in 2020 the Ange Melagro Prize for his outstanding
class Science and Spirituality. In 2023 Roel received the
Outstanding Faculty Award from the Mines Board of Trustees.
From 2000-2014 he was a firefighter in Genesee Fire Rescue
where he served for two years as Fire Chief. Roel also works
as a life coach, visit https://roelcoaching.com
for more information.