The vulnerability of civil infrastructure to natural hazards represents one of the greatest threats to life, property, and ultimately the safety and well-being of communities. In response, the National Science Foundation (NSF) established the Natural Hazards Engineering Research Infrastructure (NHERI) as a shared-use, distributed national network. NHERI’s geographically distributed components (see Figure 1) enable physical tests and numerical simulations of groundbreaking concepts to improve the resilience of civil infrastructure and protect people and communities against earthquakes, windstorms, tsunamis, and storm surge. The mission of the NHERI Network Coordination Office (NCO, NSF CMMI-1612144) was to serve as focal point and leader of the multi-hazards research community mitigating the future impact of natural hazards. Outcomes from the NCO’s leadership are described in three strategic goals: Leadership, Research, and Education and Community Outreach. 

Leadership: Fair and transparent governance brought community input into all NHERI operations. Under the NCO’s leadership, the wind, coastal, earthquake, and tsunami communities came together, for the first time, to establish common priorities and research strategies, now embodied in the NHERI Science Plan. Another significant achievement was publication of the NHERI special collection, Natural Hazards Engineering Research Infrastructure (NHERI) 2016-2020: Mitigating the Impact of Natural Hazards on Civil Infrastructure and Communities. This peer-reviewed e-book, published by Frontiers in Built Environment, consists of 16 contributions by 122 authors drawn from NHERI and NSF awardees. As of January 2022, it has garnered over 51,000 views. 

Research: The NHERI Science Plan, referenced in the NSF Engineering for Civil Infrastructure program solicitation, integrates contributions from all NHERI components. The NCO coordinated the plan’s development and dissemination: the first edition, published in July 2017, and the second in January 2020, represent major achievements under this strategic goal. The plan brought multiple research communities together to document the research priorities of the natural hazards community; informed researchers, practitioners, and funding agencies; and served as a guide future research. Another notable research accomplishment was the execution of Letters of Agreement with international partners: NIED/E-Defense in Japan; the National Center for Research on Earthquake Engineering in Taiwan; and the EUCENTRE Foundation, European Centre for Training and Research in Earthquake Engineering in Pavia, Italy.  

Education and Community Outreach: The NCO established and led successful activities impacting the natural hazards engineering community, including K-12 teachers, undergraduate and graduate students, junior faculty, and practitioners. The NCO’s Summer Institute (SI) program was impactful through multiple measures, including diverse participation and the promotion of success for early-career faculty. The NCO supported 60 early-career faculty members with SI travel awards, of which 46% were female, 17% underrepresented racial and ethnic minorities, and 31% first-generation college students. Through a LinkedIn group, 31 SI alumni remain in contact with NHERI and one another to celebrate their accomplishments. Currently, 69% of SI alumni hold an assistant professor role, and 7% have been promoted to a tenured position. 7 post-doc and graduate-student SI alumni have secured tenure-track positions. Participants have secured $11,849,497 in NSF grant funding from 25 awards. This includes 3 CAREER awards, which is particularly significant because of the SI’s emphasis on CAREER workshops and awardee panels. 

The Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) program is another example of NCO coordination with NHERI components that achieved diverse participation and launched successful career trajectories. The NCO supported 77 undergraduates to conduct natural hazards research; NHERI REU students created 30 K-12 lesson plans. 56% of participants were female, 42% identified as members of ethnic/racial underrepresented groups, and 31% are first-generation college students. Many alumni are still in school, but longitudinal surveys have documented their progress and trajectories. Six alumni are currently in PhD engineering programs, and 32% of alumni have gone on to graduate school after graduation. 61% have graduated from their university. 

Successful community outreach outcomes indicate a high-functioning community that shares resources, performs interdisciplinary investigations, and encourages development of new talent. Outreach took place through multiple communication channels within and external to NHERI. Within NHERI, electronic monthly and quarterly newsletters as well as weekly e-mail announcements reached 6,000 subscribers through the NHERI cyber-collaboration platform, DesignSafe-CI. These communications informed the community of new research projects, resources, educational activities and opportunities, and impacts of NHERI work. An audience of 550 external to NHERI received 3-5 news releases per quarter, establishing NHERI expertise with a very broad audience. A weekly external newsletter curating natural-hazards news gained 480 subscribers with a high open-rate of 50%. NHERI’s online newsroom became one of the more highly-visited pages (nearly 3,000 visitors per quarter) on the DesignSafe-CI website. DesignSafe Radio, an NCO-created podcast, established a devoted following with hundreds of downloads per quarter. Additionally, the NCO conducted social media campaigns on Facebook (733 followers) and Twitter (1288 followers) that received strong engagement and were particularly effective with students and early-career researchers.