A national OSS E/PO Support Network of organizations, including four educational Forums and seven Broker/Faciliators is in place to help OSS investigators and flight projects use the available resources to create and disseminate effective, well coordinated E/PO products and activities. The Support Network works in collaboration with NASA's Education Division and the Minority University Research and Education Division as a part of NASA's overall Education effort.

The OSS "Support Network" is a nationwide infrastructure of space science education/outreach groups whose purpose is to aid space science investigators in identifying and developing high-quality E/PO opportunities. This infrastructure fosters partnerships between the space science and E/PO communities, and provides the services needed to establish and maintain a vital national, coordinated, long-term OSS E/PO program. Of particular interest to OSS proposers are two types of groups whose general aim is to help scientists turn results from space science missions and programs into educationally appropriate activities suitable for regional and/or national dissemination:

Forums
Four educational Forums, each one oriented toward one of the four OSS science themes (Astronomical Search for Origins, Solar System Exploration, Structure and Evolution of the Universe, and Sun-Earth Connections). The Forums are co-located with prominent research institutions and are national in scope. The Forums support, help organize, and disseminate the E/PO efforts of OSS missions and research programs related to their theme.

Broker/Facilitators
Seven regional E/PO Broker/Facilitators, each one serving educators and OSS scientists in their assigned regions by helping to identify high-leverage E/PO opportunities and arranging appropriate alliances between the science and education communities. The Broker/Facilitators work across all OSS themes.

It is not the function of the Forums and Brokers to provide E/PO funding or to prepare E/PO proposal segments. The responsibility for actually developing the E/PO program and writing the proposal is that of the proposer. However, existing and prospective investigators are strongly encouraged to make use of Forums and Brokers to help identify suitable E/PO opportunities and arrange appropriate alliances between the space scientists and E/PO partners. The integrity of this process is important and is at the heart of the successful implementation of the approach OSS is taking to E/PO. Thus the Forums and Brokers have adopted a set of Operating Principles to ensure that they will provide fair and equitable services to the space science and education communities.

Operating Principles of the NASA OSS E/PO Support Network

1. Education Forums and Broker/Facilitators will provide fair and equitable services to all customers of the OSS Education Support Network. Such services include: advice on proposal preparation; ideas on Education and Public Outreach (E/PO); and information on partnership opportunities with a wide variety of E/PO institutions and programs within and outside of NASA.

2. Forums or Broker/Facilitators, in their capacity as members of the Support Network, will not write E/PO segments of OSS AO or NRA proposals. In all cases, the responsibility for formulating the E/PO program and preparing a proposal is that of the proposer.

3. Forums and Broker/Facilitators will treat E/PO proposals prepared by Ecosystem customers - who respond to NASA OSS AOs and NRAs - as proprietary information.

4. Forum and Broker/Facilitators are, in some cases, embedded in larger host organizations that have ongoing E/PO programs. To ensure fair and equitable services, Support Network members and their host organizations will follow existing best and fair business practices and good faith measures used by NASA and the space science research community regarding pre-proposal information dissemination, proposal creation, peer review, and proposal selection.

5. Forums and Broker/Facilitators will provide information to Support Network customers about options for partnership that feature competing possibilities and capabilities other than those of their host organization.

6. Support Network personnel will not participate in the review of E/PO segments of OSS proposals for which they have directly rendered services, or in which they or their host institutions are listed as partners.