User Forum Notes for 7-2-2021

Notes: Cezanna Semnacher and Faustine Bernadac

Attendees: (24 users) Leanne Rossi, Ian Kuplar, Sarah Messenger, Isabel Eaton, Lexy Salinas, Ruby An, Jason Dobkowski, Eli Gomez, Jojo Baldus, Asha Kaliappan, Jess Richert, Miriam Ritchie, Nicole Williamson, Jess Steketee, Alex Medvedeff, Caroline Brose, Erin Van der Jeugdt, Cameron Jones, Selina Cheng,Sarah Ansbro, Jeremy May, Mike Weintraub, Roxaneh Khorsand, Alex Jennings

(14 staff & management) Donie Bret-Harte, Amanda Young, Dennis Wasserman, Cezanna Semnacher, Kela Vicich, Bodie Davies, Faustine Bernadac, Justin Johnson, Dani Aguirre, Rowan McPherson, Olivia Cronin-Golomb, Randy Fulweber, Kevin Williams, Alex Radion

Updates around camp based on 2020 users forum: 

• no comments

Pending action items remaining from 2020: 

• no comments

General requests/comments (many from the suggestion box or submitted online): 

• Sometimes entering the staff office is awkward to grab medicine and can be uncomfortable. Can we move that? 
• Scott: We can definitely plan to move the meds somewhere else. Anything on those shelves, there is a copy in the EMT shack.  
• Sarah: Sensitive items could also be added to the shmod, including bandaids, etc. 
• Everyone would really appreciate having a large pool swan for the lake. 
• Justin: suggests unicorns. 
• Jason: suggests a paddle boat
• Taking more notice of what land Toolik is on. Historical land use and land acknowledgements included in the orientation as well. Potentially a start to the orientation.
• Give Bodie a raise. 
• Electric keyboard to complement the guitars and drums (3 more additional comments on this!)
• Shoutout to the EDC for 2020/2021 for remote access
• Toolik orientation could use an injection of energy and inspiration. What if there was a powerpoint full of photos full of important points? I.e. check-out board and noticing quiet hours, etc.
• Justin: Video online to shorten orientation. We want to get to these tasks, but may take some time to get to where we want to be. 
• Eli: Gets that giving orientations is hard to give so consistently. Very dense. 
• Roxaneh: Have your own youtube channel. 
• Amanda: QR codes for usage of how to do things when people don’t know how! An additional way to share knowledge 
• Jess: Not everyone’s phone can use a QR code. 
• People like the in person orientation. 
• Reliable internet in the dorms! Lack of internet makes noisy dorms especially hard to be in. 
• Faustine: help from OIT is in motion, however, they are scrambling to find proper equipment with COVID in the works. Avoiding this situation moving forward is a goal. It’s complex and expensive. Meeting with the NSF moving forward and working it into the plan. 
• Solar panels on buildings or explore wind power. Start slow.  
• Faustine: renewable energy is something that we often discuss and want long term. It’s an expensive ticket item that’s not usually feasible. Absolutely would be a good way to move forward. We are also looking at ways to use waste heat and be aware of how efficient we can feasibly make TFS. 
• Donie: Price of solar panels is coming down. Push under Obama admin. to get more green, not w/ Trump… How to balance electric loads makes it challenging to integrate within our system along with the price point. Reducing the need to heat the garage with waste heat. 
• Faustine: We work on a limited budget and NSF would probably want to fund us more in this area. Very competitive price wise. Hard to argue for a more expensive system. Justin: Waste heat to the kitchen as well. 
• Eli: A shoe rack in sauna to encourage people to take off their shoes. If you provide the option, it will likely be a solution. Justin: says this would be easy. 4 are available
• More small frame bikes for smaller people (in camp and mtn bikes). 
• Faustine: we have funds to get more bikes, however, bike availability is at least 6 months out. 
• Mirror height in the dorms is really high up for shorter people.
• Mental health support services. Toolik can be high stress and isolating. Working an unhealthy amount, getting disconnected from family and friends. Safety and well being… It is a safety necessity to be on your A game when doing fieldwork. Covid exacerbates this. 
• Scott: We are currently working on this, it has a lot of moving parts. Scott has services for the meantime. Has a compiled list of affordable options. At the forefront of our minds. Thank you for sharing this subject. Everyone can and should take advantage of mental health resources when at camp and even when not at camp. This list can set you up with someone even when you aren’t at Toolik. Mental health is not a short term thing. Encourages people to pursue this when not just as camp. You have to find the right person for you which can take a decent amount of time. Starting these things can be stressful as you unpack a lot of your baggage, but it’s important. Scott has resources. Takes a lot of work. The sooner the better. 
• Donie: We’ve spent time conversing on this with NSF. There is a wilderness medicine group. This could act as short term help. NSF wants UAF to provide as many resources as possible. NSF agrees to the wilderness medicine group as a short term emergency option. 
• Eli: How do I see these resources? And what if I don’t want to ask Scott for this list?  
• Scott: right now the list is nowhere, but Scott is happy to share it and we can put it on the website. We could post it somewhere so you don’t have to ask.
• Nicole: How to work with UAF?  
• Isabel: Remote access mental health has become quite good. 
• Scott: Resources from your home institutions can be looked into. Many fees have waived since pandemic times. 
• Is the housing map really necessary? It’s not comfortable having everyone in camp know what room you are in. 
• Justin: Managers, safety, EMT need to know, but this could be pulled down. We can talk about this in the community. 
• Salina: Could be moved to the manager's/office space? 
• Justin: Pulling down would be a preventative measure. If we were to pull it, then we should pull it completely. 
• Faustine: can see the downside of the transparency, we could potentially keep the transparency internally. Rooms are lockable, and you are allowed to get a key for your room if preferred. If people feel that it’s not comfortable, then we shouldn't do it. 
• Eli: could be an option on myToolik whether to disclose info. 
• Sarah: There's really not a great reason for everyone to know everyone’s location. 
• Faustine: Lab assignments – 
• Isabel: sees risk in personal rooms and not necessarily labs, but doesn’t assume that there’s not ever risk in labs. 
• Justin: Business wise, the lab chart is super helpful.
• Donie: suspect that without housing/lab assignments, you’ll get lots of questions. Pretty handy to have the charts. 
• Amanda: People seem solid on having lab charts posted. 
• Battery wall charger in the science workshop is amazing! Justin noted that this was a request in previous forums. Yay action. 
• Quiet residential sign on towers. 
• Justin/Faustine: working to separate the tower off the Muskox building. 
• Entire science community would benefit from a full sized pool table. 
• Faustine: Pool table that converts into normal table? 
• A keyboard, an electric keyboard.
• Return dining hall arrangement to pre-Covid times. 
• Scott: We can’t remove Covid procedures quite yet. For the time being, dining facilities will stay as is.We can’t remove everything at once. We appreciate everyone’s participation. We have to keep current policies steady. 
• Donie: NSF comment, what would happen if quarantine wasn’t enough? Low probability, high impact. NSF appreciates the rigorous in-camp procedures. Medical board is rather conseravtive and needs to sign off on requested procedures. The medical board is watching for larger continental trends and overall looking out for your safety. 
• Lawn games: Can-Jam, Spike Ball, etc. 
• Better ways to communicate if you aren’t comfortable driving the dalton up and down from fbx to TFS. 
• Justin: If we have put you in an uncomfortable position being asked to drive, you can always send an email for a work around. 
• Scott: Please speak up if you're feeling unsafe or uncomfortable. Everyone would be happier if you reached out to make a change. 
• Cyclists asks if they can use TFS for housing/food in June 2021 – 
• Faustine: we missed this opportunity, however, would not have worked with Covid. If we see people in distress, we will try to help.
• Really appreciating the return of staff with knowledge of birds, camera work, and narration of naturalist journal. 
• Would be great to have a shower stall in the sauna to have a more private area to wash. Justin: in the long term plan. Backside to the north of the sauna is intended for working on the deck. It is in future plans to install a shower. Not as feasible at the moment unless we got temporary pop up showers or curtains (suggested by Sarah and Jason). 
• People would really appreciate it if they could buy Toolik merchandise for friends and family. 
• Faustine: difficult to navigate what we can and cannot do within the university. We cannot handle cash in much more capacity than we do with postcards. This is more of a conversation for Admin. Would be nice to have physical items at Toolik to make available for people. 
• Justin: Maybe the UAF campus store could sell Toolik swag. 
• Amanda: hiring a new fiscal officer that could help with this. 
• Mike: Toolik foundation idea on steering committee. Maybe tshirts could be handled through the Toolik foundation. 
• Fundraiser to get funds for wifi extender, board games, merchandise.
• Roxaneh: not all your projects are NSF funded, and not all PIs are getting emails from Battelle. If you are a PI from a non NSF funded project, you are kept out of the loop. Would be helpful to reach out to all PIs with updated protocols even if they don't work directly with NSF. 
• Scott: TFS website is updated often. We have put forward the rules and guidelines as listed on the website. We’ll be sure to include everyone in the listserv with large changes. Non Battelle-ARO supported projects that have concerns should talk to Scott. Easier for Scott to handle issues one on one. 
• Roxaneh appreciates all that has been done. Believes there needs to be a broadening of culture. Some researchers get funded, but it’s not long term. In the future, covid or not, all PIs should feel included regardless of their funding source. 
• Donie: Everyone is welcome to the town hall mtg. Trying to get NSF to cover lodging for all, but this was too big for them. 
• Scott: People always get lost in the cracks, and we are happy to address questions however need be. We are here for you. We are here to answer your questions. If you don’t feel supported, let us know, and we will step up to the plate and try our best to help out. 
• Faustine: Covid has really highlighted how different projects are supported. Internally we are also thinking of ways that Toolik can support projects that fall outside of the contract so that they can receive the same level of support. 
• Eli: Add an 8th day to the week 
• Mike: Thanks to the TFS staff

Common use equipment/procurement: no comments

Kitchen (no kitchen staff attended the meeting): 

• More tofu for the vegetarian options for meals. 
• Nicole: Perhaps more protein options for the vegetarians. 
• Alex: Sometimes the protein isn’t always as noticeable. 
• Cigarettes for the snack wall 
• Hot cheetos on the snack wall
• Awesome salad bar. Thank you for all the freshies and interesting ingredients! Also says, “ever wrestled a bear?”
• Sour gummy worms/bears/ things! 
• Write the vegetarian main dish on the mini board. 
• Laura: Will be a bit difficult
• Meat eaters should be allowed to eat the fish option as well if there is also a meat option. 
• Amanda: If categories on the myToolik don’t make sense, we can make changes for clarifications. 
• Alex from kitchen: Talked about that today, are in the works of revamping. 
• Faustine: Add vegan. 
• Sarah: what if you were a meat eater that doesn’t eat fish on a fish night?
• Pizza every Saturday
• Cheers for the kitchen staff for amazing dinners and dessert <3 
• More lentils
• Scott wants Laura to know that he made the curry tofu salad