I am the Founding Director (Emeritus) of the NOAA cooperative science center for Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology (NCAS-M). Formerly, I was the Founding Director and Principal Investigator of the NOAA Center for Atmospheric Sciences (2001 – 2017). These centers were principally aligned with the National Weather Service but also partnered with other branches of NOAA and other federal agencies (e.g. EPA, NASA, DoD) and private sector partners. NCAS-M is the largest and most multidisciplinary research program on the Howard University campus. As of 2020, it supported the research of over sixty students, postdoctoral fellows, and faculty spanning four colleges and eight departments on the Howard University campus and at its twelve partnering academic institutions: Jackson State University, University of Maryland Baltimore County, the University of Maryland College Park, Penn State University, the University of Puerto Rico at Mayaguez, the University of Texas El Paso, Fort Valley State University. Universidad Metropolitana de San Juan, San Jose State University, San Diego State University, Tuskegee University, and the New York University at Albany. NCAS research integrates disciplines as economics, journalism, psychology, and sociology into research on marine sciences, climate change, and atmospheric chemistry to address 21st century challenges for science, technology and society.