The Meteorological Service of Canada (MSC), in conjunction with the Cooperative Program for Operational Meteorology, Education and Training (COMET®), held its inaugural Winter Weather Forecasting Course from February 11 to 23. The course was held at COMET, located in Boulder, Colorado. The one-time funding for this course was acquired through the Environment Canada Learning Fund. It is envisioned that the course will be used as an impetus for the development of winter weather distance learning modules and to foster their use in MSC weather centres.

Participants in the first MSC/COMET Winter Weather Course included representatives from all five MSC Regions, from Aviation and Defense Services and from the Canadian Meteorological Centre. In addition, as part of an ongoing effort to partner with the National Weather Service (NWS) on mutually beneficial training, two NWS forecasters, from their Western and Eastern Regions, participated on the course.

In late July of 1999, an invitation was extended to the MSC to participate on the seven week COMAP (Course on mesoscale analysis and prediction), to commence on August 2. In part due to serendipity, Kent Johnson (Mountain Weather Centre, Kelowna) was able to accept the offer. A primary goal of this participation was to observe the leading-edge training provided to NWS Science Operations Officers (SOO) and to make recommendations for an appropriate training model for MSC meteorologists. The COMAP was very heavily focused on summer convective weather and rather scant in the area of winter weather. In addition, forecasting in complex terrain was largely ignored.

After the COMAP concluded, a set of recommendations was submitted, including the development of a two to three week course, for Canadian meteorologists, focusing on winter weather. From these recommendations, with the leadership of the Director of the MSC Meteorological Research Branch, a proposal was submitted to the Environment Canada (EC) Learning Fund. This proposal, for a prototype residence course on winter weather, was adopted early in the year 2000.

In early summer of 2000, an agreement was reached between the MSC and COMET to jointly develop a two week winter weather course for Canadian meteorologists. As per the COMET residence course model, two lead instructors were chosen, one from the academic community and one from the operational community. John Gyakum (McGill University) and Kent Johnson (MSC - Kelowna) agreed to fulfill the roles of lead instructor.

Several conflicting factors influenced the choice of dates for the inaugural MSC/COMET Winter Weather Course. First, during the period from late January to May of 2001, the COMET facility was heavily booked, in part due to an extended closure for renovations. Second, for John Gyakum, dates outside of the typical academic term were preferred. Finally, given that the course focus was to be winter weather, it would be beneficial to have the option of examining real-time winter weather each day. After weighing all the options, the February dates were chosen.

In August of 2000, the two lead instructors met with COMET staff in Boulder to develop a preliminary outline and list of guest instructors. A decision was made to hold the course in a similar fashion to the COMAP with guest instructors providing the bulk of the lectures. Over the subsequent few months, invitations to guest instructors were sent and the draft course schedule was modified. Virtually all of the instructors accepted the invitations and the semi-final schedule for Week 1 and Week 2 was adopted in early January. A course website was established at the same time.

The course was designed to focus on hazardous winter season meteorology, from the synoptic scale to the mesoscale. The schedule built from the larger scale in Week 1 to the mesoscale in Week 2. The sole significant deviation from winter weather was the section on extratropical transition. Although not experienced during the winter season, it seemed appropriate to cover the transition from barotropic to baroclinic systems in a winter weather course.

The initial plan included invitations to 14 MSC meteorologists, two each from Atlantic, Quebec, Ontario, Prairie and Northern and Pacific and Yukon Regions as well as two each from the Canadian Meteorological Centre and Aviation and Defense Services. In addition, four adjoining NWS Regions, Alaska, Western, Central and Eastern were each invited to send one representative on the course. Each MSC component was responsible for nominating the representatives from those meteorologists who are involved with operational forecasting. Unfortunately, NWS Alaska Region and Central Region were unable to take advantage of the opportunity. Their loss was a gain for two MSC Regions who were offered the extra places. The total of 18 students represents the comfortable capacity of the COMET classroom.

Given that Canadian meteorologists used workstations and software, which were new to them, the course commenced on Sunday February 11, with presentations and a lab designed for familiarization. Through these exercises, students were able to officially start the course on Monday, with some rudimentary technological ability.

An ancillary benefit of a residence course is the interaction with colleagues from across Canada and even the United States. Students commented on the importance of having direct contact with their colleagues. One participant stated

Week 1 course topics included

• continental cyclogenesis
• anti-cyclogenesis
• marine cyclogenesis
• waves and storm surges
• extratropical transition
• slantwise convection
• TROWALS and upper level fronts
• snow microphysics
• jet streaks and cyclogenesis
• melting-induced circulations

Week 2 course topics included

• isentropic potential vorticity and the dynamic tropopause
• aircraft icing
• downslope windstorms
• gap winds
• blowing snow
• freezing precipitation
• air quality in complex terrain
• avalanche meteorology
• QPF in complex terrain
• west coast heavy rain
• understanding melting/freezing processes and modeling them.

The students were able to choose from a wide variety of activities for the weekend in the middle of the course. With the use of the COMET vans, there was a skiing trip, a Denver tour, an arduous hike (another picture) and a trip to Rocky Mountain National Park.

The COMET classroom is developed for operational meteorology training. The oblong shaped room is split into a lecture portion and a lab portion with 9 full PC/HP workstation lab areas. A huge advantage of the COMET experience is the infrastructure, which is in place, both in the classroom and outside the classroom. COMET staff solves problems with accommodation, COMET vans are available for local transportation and any required administrative support is provided for students and instructors. By removing potential outside distractions, the excellent learning environment is enhanced considerably. Students are able to fully concentrate on the science of meteorology.

Clearly, the biggest challenge to Canadians at COMET is the technology as workstation software is quite different from that used in Canada. This was effectively overcome in the course although significant improvement is possible for future courses. Overall, the course operated relatively smoothly, with last-minute problems or deficiencies quickly overcome with the assistance of the COMET staff.

For this prototype course, a comprehensive evaluation is required in order to demonstrate the value of the residence training and to use in future endeavours such as this. The final evaluation will not be completed until late in 2001, once the knowledge transfer component to operational meteorologists can be assessed. In addition, the evaluation will assess the relationship between residence and distance learning opportunities, specifically, whether a residence course has the potential to increase the use of distance learning in weather centers.

Prior to the course, each participant completed a questionnaire to establish expectations, preparation and current levels of training and distance learning. During the course, students were expected each day to provide evaluation (if accessing the form, enter a 0 in the 4-digit ID) comments on each portion of the previous day including the various lecturers, the lab as well as other logistical feedback. Two post-course questionnaires are also part of the overall evaluation data and will be completed by the students a few weeks after the course (post-course questionnaire 1) and six to eight months after the course (post-course questionnaire 2).

Results from all the student feedback will be used to develop the final course evaluation.

The inaugural MSC/COMET Winter Weather Course was, by all preliminary indications, an overwhelming success. Staff at COMET commented that the student evaluations were among the best they had seen for an initial offering of any course. Like any scientific training undertaking, there were a number of aspects that would be done differently next time. A preliminary list of these has been drafted and will be included in the subsequent evaluation. The ultimate goal of the course was for participants to increase their understanding of winter weather phenomena and then to transfer this knowledge to local forecast centre meteorologists. The level to which these goals were achieved remains to be determined.