Faculty member earns prestigious award

Bill Clinton rewards assistant professor for work in research

By Lynde Smith
Staff Writer

For the first time ever, the Presidential Early Career Award for scientists and engineers was awarded to a Purdue faculty member.

Carol Anne Clayson, assistant professor of earth and atmospheric sciences, was among 59 researchers to recently be named by former President Clinton as a recipient. The award was established in 1996 and is the highest honor given by the U.S. government to young research professionals.

Clayson conducts her research on computer modeling of the interaction between the atmosphere and the ocean. She focuses on the way the atmosphere and the ocean change each other.

She hopes to help scientists better understand how events that happen on a short time scale in small regions can influence longer climate time scales.

Clayson received the Young Investigator Award in 2000 from the Office of Naval Research. To get the Young Investigator Award she had to submit a research proposal suggesting what she would do with the money if she received it. She also had to submit her résumé.

"To be successful at this you must be able to state clearly what you want to investigate, how you are going to do it and why it is important," Clayson said.

To receive one of these awards means that you proposed good work and that you have done good work, she said.

A committee nominated Clayson for the Young Investigators Award. They picked the top two winners from the Young Investigators Awards and then nominated them for the Presidential Award.

Clayson said that she felt honored and fortunate.

"Sometimes you are just in the right place at the right time," she said. "Or rather you have the right ideas at the right time."

The two awards included money to further her research. The money will go in a few different directions, Clayson said.

For every research award that comes in, a portion of it goes to the University to use, which can help keep tuition down for students, she said.

"The money is good because it pays for equipment and helps out graduate students," said Clayson. "It is money meant to do something with. You must tell them what you do with it."

There was a ceremony and reception for all of the award winners in Washington, D.C., in October of 2000.

"It was fun because I saw people from the National Science Foundation or NASA and what they really want is to encourage science research," Clayson said.

To talk to people and hear their expectations of you is an honor, but now you feel an obligation to live up to those expectations, she said.

The President was scheduled to present the awards up until a week before the ceremony, but then the Middle East peace crisis broke out and he had to meet with King Jordan instead.

Clayson said that at this point the Vice President was supposed to give out the awards, but since it was October he was out campaigning.

Neal Lane, the head of the office of Science and Technology Policy at the time, presented the awards instead.

They were given a special tour of the White House, and while they were waiting outside, President Clinton drove by and waved at them.

Johnson, who is Clayson's husband, said it was weird to go to the ceremony because he went as a spouse.

"A lot of the spouses were men and that showed how many women were awarded," Johnson said.

Her husband said that he is proud of his wife for receiving the award.

"It raises my own personal expectations," Johnson said. "I want to rise to her level.

"I think this is a good award for my wife and it validated a lot of the work that she has done scientifically," he said. "It was very motivating for me."

Clayson earned her Bachelor's Degree in physics at Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah.

She then attended the University of Colorado in Boulder for her Master's and Ph.D. Both of these degrees were in Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences.

After completing her Ph.D., Clayson came straight to Purdue in August of 1995.

Along with her research, Clayson teaches a few courses ranging from freshman to graduate levels. These include courses such as Geos 109, "Earth System Science."

This is freshman level course that discusses what we learn from meteorology, oceanography and geology. It gets the students attuned to the idea that all elements of the earth interact with each other, said Clayson.

She also instructs Atms 535, "Boundary Layer Meteorology." This is a required class for seniors. It discusses the part of the atmosphere that is affected by the earth's surface.

Another course she teaches is Atms 403, "Physical Oceanography."

"I enjoy teaching at all the different levels," she said. "Teaching to freshmen is different than teaching to seniors. It takes a different type of teaching to really interest people in something.

"I have always wanted to be a professor. That was always a goal, but I didn't know what in. And amazingly that worked out. I feel very fortunate."

Clayson said she enjoys being at a university and doing research and interacting with students.

"There really aren’t that many jobs that you can do both with," she said.

"The most frustration you feel is that it takes time to do both and you only have so much," she said. "It is a constant struggle but enjoyable."

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