[House Hearing, 117 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]





                                 ______


 
                       BUILDING A SAFER ANTARCTIC
                          RESEARCH ENVIRONMENT

=======================================================================

                                     
                                     
                                     

                                HEARING

                               BEFORE THE

                      COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, SPACE,
                             AND TECHNOLOGY

                                 OF THE

                        HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                    ONE HUNDRED SEVENTEENTH CONGRESS

                             SECOND SESSION

                               __________

                            DECEMBER 6, 2022

                               __________

                           Serial No. 117-72

                               __________

 Printed for the use of the Committee on Science, Space, and Technology

                                     
                                     
                                     
    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
                                  
                                     
                                     
                                     

       Available via the World Wide Web: http://science.house.gov
       
       
       
                           ______

             U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE 
 49-691          WASHINGTON : 2023
       
       

              COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, SPACE, AND TECHNOLOGY

             HON. EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas, Chairwoman
ZOE LOFGREN, California              FRANK LUCAS, Oklahoma, 
SUZANNE BONAMICI, Oregon                 Ranking Member
AMI BERA, California                 MO BROOKS, Alabama
HALEY STEVENS, Michigan,             BILL POSEY, Florida
    Vice Chair                       RANDY WEBER, Texas
MIKIE SHERRILL, New Jersey           BRIAN BABIN, Texas
JAMAAL BOWMAN, New York              ANTHONY GONZALEZ, Ohio
MELANIE A. STANSBURY, New Mexico     MICHAEL WALTZ, Florida
BRAD SHERMAN, California             JAMES R. BAIRD, Indiana
ED PERLMUTTER, Colorado              DANIEL WEBSTER, Florida
JERRY McNERNEY, California           MIKE GARCIA, California
PAUL TONKO, New York                 STEPHANIE I. BICE, Oklahoma
BILL FOSTER, Illinois                YOUNG KIM, California
DONALD NORCROSS, New Jersey          RANDY FEENSTRA, Iowa
DON BEYER, Virginia                  JAKE LaTURNER, Kansas
SEAN CASTEN, Illinois                CARLOS A. GIMENEZ, Florida
CONOR LAMB, Pennsylvania             JAY OBERNOLTE, California
DEBORAH ROSS, North Carolina         PETER MEIJER, Michigan
GWEN MOORE, Wisconsin                JAKE ELLZEY, TEXAS
DAN KILDEE, Michigan                 MIKE CAREY, OHIO
SUSAN WILD, Pennsylvania
LIZZIE FLETCHER, Texas
VACANCY
                         C  O  N  T  E  N  T  S

                            December 6, 2022

                                                                   Page

Hearing Charter..................................................     2

                           Opening Statements

Statement by Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson, Chairwoman, 
  Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of 
  Representatives................................................    10
    Written Statement............................................    11

Statement by Representative Frank Lucas, Ranking Member, 
  Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of 
  Representatives................................................    12
    Written Statement............................................    13

                               Witnesses:

Dr. Karen Marrongelle, Chief Operating Officer, National Science 
  Foundation
    Oral Statement...............................................    15
    Written Statement............................................    18

Ms. Kathleen Naeher, Chief Operating Officer of the Civil Group, 
  Leidos
    Oral Statement...............................................    31
    Written Statement............................................    33

Dr. Angela V. Olinto, Dean of the Physical Sciences Division and 
  Albert A. Michelson Distinguished Service Professor, University 
  of Chicago
    Oral Statement...............................................    36
    Written Statement............................................    38

Dr. Anne Kelly, Deputy Director, The Nature Conservancy Alaska 
  Chapter
    Oral Statement...............................................    42
    Written Statement............................................    44

Discussion.......................................................    53

              Appendix: Answers to Post-Hearing Questions

Dr. Karen Marrongelle, Chief Operating Officer, National Science 
  Foundation.....................................................    70

Ms. Kathleen Naeher, Chief Operating Officer of the Civil Group, 
  Leidos.........................................................    79

Dr. Angela V. Olinto, Dean of the Physical Sciences Division and 
  Albert A. Michelson Distinguished Service Professor, University 
  of Chicago.....................................................    84


                       BUILDING A SAFER ANTARCTIC



                          RESEARCH ENVIRONMENT

                              ----------                              


                       TUESDAY, DECEMBER 6, 2022

                          House of Representatives,
               Committee on Science, Space, and Technology,
                                                   Washington, D.C.

    The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 12:57 p.m., in 
room 2318, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Eddie Bernice 
Johnson [Chairwoman of the Committee] presiding.

[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
 
    Chairwoman Johnson. The meeting will come to order. And 
without objection, the Chair is authorized to declare recess at 
any time.
    Before I deliver my opening remarks, I wanted to note that, 
today, the Committee is meeting both in person and virtually. I 
want to announce a couple of reminders to Members about the 
conduct of this hearing. First, Members and staff who are 
attending in person may choose to be masked, but it is not a 
requirement. However, any individual with symptoms, a positive 
test, or exposure to someone with COVID-19 should wear a mask 
while present. Members who are attending virtually should keep 
their video feed on as long as they are present in the hearing. 
Members are responsible for their own microphones, so please 
also keep your microphones muted until you are speaking.
    And finally, if Members have documents they wish to submit 
to the record, please email them to the Committee Clerk, whose 
email address was circulated prior to the meeting.
    Good afternoon to our Members and to our panelists, and 
thank you for joining us here today. It has been my honor to 
chair this Committee for the past four years. For three decades 
I have served on this Committee. Over all that time and prior 
to my tenure in Washington, I have been passionate about 
breaking down barriers for women. If left unaddressed, hostile 
cultures keep women and marginalized individuals from achieving 
their full potential and hinder our progress. So as a result, I 
can think of no more important hearing than the one we're 
holding today to conclude my time on the Science Committee.
    The U.S. Antarctic Program (USAP) funds cutting-edge and 
essential research that cannot take place anywhere but 
Antarctica. In harsh conditions, geologists peer millions of 
years into the past by boring deep into the ice sheet. Dark 
skies offer an unparalleled site to observe distant galaxies. 
Biologists study life that thrives in extreme conditions on 
land and under sea.
    Unfortunately, the challenges facing scientists in 
Antarctica are not merely those imposed by the elements. While 
several Federal agencies support research in Antarctica, the 
National Science Foundation (NSF) has been the--has the 
responsibility of managing all U.S. and Antarctic research 
activities. In August, the National Science Foundation released 
a report on sexual harassment and assaults in the Antarctic 
program. Its findings are sobering. The research and the report 
contains harrowing stories of individuals enduring threats to 
their physical safety, gender taunts, and intimidation. 
Community members do not trust the agency or contractor to keep 
them safe from these harms. Multiple people spoke of their fear 
of being retaliated against for reporting an assault. Survivors 
and advocates on ice fear they will be placed on a blacklist. 
Meanwhile, high-ranking perpetrators receive apologies instead 
of penalties.
    We must not tolerate any culture that enables pervasive 
harassment and assault. While the Antarctica program presents 
unique challenges such challenges must not be used as an excuse 
for inadequate response and corrective actions.
    I'm proud that the Committee passed the Combating Sexual 
Harassment in Science Act. This became law this summer in the 
CHIPS & Science Act, but clearly, there's more work to be done, 
including when it comes to the responsibility of Federal 
contractors. Today, we will discuss how all stakeholders must 
engage with one another and with the Antarctic community. 
Companies have a responsibility to protect employee privacy. 
However, the National Science Foundation must have the 
necessary information to keep people safe and to keep offenders 
off the ice.
    The SAHPR (``Sexual Assault/Harassment Prevention and 
Response'') report may be focused on Antarctica, but these 
problems plague field sites beyond the continent. I hope that 
the CHIPS & Science provisions and what we learn today serve as 
a foundation for further action. I've been heartened by the 
bipartisan action this Committee has taken to address sexual 
harassment, and it is my hope that this work will continue into 
the next Congress. I'll take this moment to thank each and 
every Member of this Committee and our Committee staffs for 
getting us to this point.
    And finally, before I yield to Ranking Member Lucas, I'd 
just like to close by noting that this is the last Full 
Committee hearing that the Science, Space, and Technology 
Committee will hold for the 117th Congress. It is also the last 
hearing I will chair as Member of Congress. Given that, I just 
want to take a moment to express my deep appreciation to 
Members and staff for us hanging together and doing a good 
amount of work.
    And in that regard, I want to give my special thanks to 
Ranking Member Lucas. He has been a constructive partner in 
what I tried to accomplish, as well as a good friend and 
professional. I am confident he will continue the bipartisan 
approach to the Committee in the 118th Congress. And we've had 
over the past two Congresses, and he knows that I will be 
watching him to make sure he does.
    And with that I express my profound appreciation to every 
Member and every staff member of this Committee.
    [The prepared statement of Chairwoman Johnson follows:]

    Good afternoon to our members and our panelists, and thank 
you for joining us here today. It has been my honor to chair 
this Committee for the past four years. For three decades, I 
have served on this Committee. Over all that time, and prior to 
my tenure in Washington, I have been passionate about breaking 
down barriers for women. If left unaddressed, hostile cultures 
keep women and marginalized individuals from achieving their 
full potential and hinder our progress. As a result, I can 
think of no more important hearing than the one we are holding 
today to conclude my time on the Science Committee.
    The U.S. Antarctic Program funds cutting-edge and essential 
research that cannot take place anywhere but Antarctica. In 
harsh conditions, geologists peer millions of years into the 
past by boring deep into the ice sheet. Dark skies offer an 
unparalleled site to observe distant galaxies. Biologists study 
life that thrives in extreme conditions on land and under sea.
    Unfortunately, the challenges facing scientists in 
Antarctica are not merely those imposed by the elements. While 
several Federal agencies support research in Antarctica, the 
National Science Foundation has the responsibility of managing 
all U.S. Antarctic research activities. In August, NSF released 
a report on sexual harassment and assaults in the Antarctic 
Program. Its findings are sobering. The report contains 
harrowing stories of individuals enduring threats to their 
physical safety, gendered taunts, and intimidation. Community 
members do not trust the agency or contractor to keep them safe 
from these harms. Multiple people spoke of their fear of being 
retaliated against for reporting an assault. Survivors and 
advocates on ice fear they will be placed on a ``blacklist.'' 
Meanwhile, high-ranking perpetrators receive apologies instead 
of penalties. We must not tolerate any culture that enables 
pervasive harassment and assault. While the Antarctic program 
presents unique challenges, such challenges must not be used as 
an excuse for an inadequate response and corrective actions.
    I am proud that this Committee passed the Combating Sexual 
Harassment in Science Act. This became law this summer in the 
CHIPS & Science Act. But clearly there is more work to be done, 
including when it comes to the responsibility of Federal 
contractors. Today we will discuss how all stakeholders must 
engage with one another and with the Antarctic community. 
Companies have a responsibility to protect employee privacy. 
However, NSF must have the necessary information to keep people 
safe, and to keep offenders off the ice.
    The SAHPR (SAPER) report may be focused on Antarctica, but 
these problems plague field sites beyond that continent. I hope 
the CHIPS & Science provisions, and what we learn today, serve 
as a foundation for further action. I've been heartened by the 
bipartisan action this Committee has taken to address sexual 
harassment. It is my hope that this work will continue into the 
next Congress.
    Finally, before I yield to Ranking Member Lucas for his 
statement, I'd just like to close by noting that this is the 
last full committee hearing that the Science, Space, and 
Technology Committee will hold in the 117th Congress. It is 
also the last hearing that I will chair as a Member of 
Congress. Given that, I just want to take a moment to express 
my deep appreciation to Members and staff on both sides of the 
aisle for all they have done to make this one of the most 
productive Congresses that this Committee has ever had. And in 
that regard, I want to give a special thanks to Ranking Member 
Lucas. He has been a constructive partner in what I've tried to 
accomplish, as well as a good friend. I am confident he will 
continue the bipartisan approach to the Committee in the 118th 
Congress that we've had over the past two congresses. And he 
knows I will be watching him to make sure that he does!.

    Chairwoman Johnson. And with that, I will yield to my 
colleague Ranking Member Lucas.
    Mr. Lucas. Good afternoon, Chairwoman Johnson, and thank 
you for holding this important hearing. Today's hearing shines 
a light on the concerning findings from the recent report 
commissioned by the National Science Foundation. The report 
found that there is a rampant culture of sexual harassment and 
assault in the remote research environment of Antarctica. As I 
have said before, sexual harassment and gender discrimination 
are unacceptable in any situation, period. It's wrong, it's 
illegal, and it's imperative that we end it.
    The report we are discussing today details a troubling 
culture at the United States Antarctic program. The program 
operates three year-round research stations and provides 
logistics support for field research. Each year, 3,500 
Americans are involved in the program's research and logistical 
activities. This includes teams of researchers, students, 
Federal contractors, and military members.
    Before diving into the report, I want to recognize that the 
research conducted on the ice is vitally important to the 
understanding of our planet and to our Nation's scientific 
leadership. The Antarctic presents a unique climate and 
environment that will allow us to conduct research that cannot 
be performed anywhere else in the world, such as detecting 
neutrinos.
    In 2009, I visited the Antarctic to view the research 
facilities and environment. This trip provided me with 
perspective on the importance of research being conducted there 
but also the environmental challenges of such remote fieldwork, 
which are hard to understand without experiencing them 
firsthand. It is the stark isolation of the Antarctic 
environment that makes the report's findings particularly 
concerning.
    According to the report, insufficient safety precautions, 
failures in broadband connectivity, and a lack of clear, 
transparent reporting structures have all contributed to an 
unsafe culture at the Antarctic research facilities. The 
science community faces unique challenges when it comes to 
addressing harassment, particularly in remote field stations. 
Individuals working in science who are affected by sexual 
harassment and discrimination can suffer long-term harm to 
their education and careers, as well as to their mental and 
physical well-being. While we can't lose sight of the 
individual cost, we must also think about the cost to our 
society and the economy as a whole. Engaging more women in STEM 
(science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) studies and 
careers is essential to American competitiveness. If we want to 
have the strongest STEM workforce in the world, it is vital 
that our research environments foster a safe and accountable 
culture.
    I want to acknowledge some of the efforts that have been 
undertaken at the NSF since the report's release to improve the 
culture of the U.S. Antarctic Program. NSF took positive steps 
by commissioning this report and seriously addressing its 
findings. I'm pleased that NSF plans to increase training and 
vetting for individuals going to the ice and to establish a 
reporting hotline. I urge NSF to remain attentive to these 
issues not only in Antarctica, but also other remote field work 
environments.
    The Science Committee has worked on a bipartisan basis to 
address these issues, such as harassment and discrimination in 
science. Products of our work were included in the recently 
passed CHIPS & Science Act. However, the report we're 
discussing today demonstrates that there's still more work to 
do, particularly on addressing the issues of harassment in the 
field.
    Today's hearing will raise some difficult questions, many 
without easy answers. How do we address these issues both 
fairly and safely? How do we navigate policies for remote field 
environments that are vastly different from each other? How do 
we navigate different command structures between the NSF, 
contractors, military members, and visiting scientists? I hope 
our witnesses and other stakeholders can help us navigate these 
questions. I'm looking forward to hearing more about how we can 
address the findings of the report to ensure that the Antarctic 
research program is safe for everyone living and working on the 
ice.
    Now, if I could take a moment of personal privilege, as the 
Chairwoman noted, this is our last hearing together, Full 
Committee hearing in this session of Congress. And I'd like to 
take this opportunity to thank the Chairwoman for her 
leadership and partnership on this issue, as well as so many 
others. Chair, I think it goes without saying but I'm going to 
note it, it has truly been an honor to serve with you, and I 
wish you all the best in whatever lies ahead of you. I have a 
hard time believing that retirement means retirement with you, 
but whatever lies ahead, the best of wishes and I have the 
highest of expectations about what you will accomplish there, 
too. Again, thank you, Chairwoman Johnson, for holding this 
hearing, and I yield back the balance of my time.
    [The prepared statement of Mr. Lucas follows:]

    Good morning, Chairwoman Johnson, and thank you for holding 
this important hearing. Today's hearing shines a light on the 
concerning findings from the recent report commissioned by the 
National Science Foundation. The report found that there is a 
rampant culture of sexual harassment and assault in the remote 
research environment of Antarctica.
    As I have said before, sexual harassment and gender 
discrimination are unacceptable in any situation. Period. It is 
wrong, it is illegal, and it is imperative that we end it.
    The report we are discussing today details a troubling 
culture in the United States Antarctic Program.
    This program operates three year-round research stations 
and provides logistical support for field research. Each year 
about 3,500 Americans are involved in the program's research 
and logistical activities. This includes teams of researchers, 
students, federal contractors, and military members.
    Before diving into the report, I want to recognize that the 
research conducted on the ice is vitally important to the 
understanding of our planet, and to our nation's scientific 
leadership. The Antarctic presents a unique climate and 
environment that allow us to conduct research that cannot be 
performed anywhere else in the world--such as detecting 
neutrinos.
    In 2009, I visited Antarctica to view the research 
facilities and environment. This trip provided me perspective 
on the importance of research being conducted, but also the 
environmental challenges of such remote field work, which are 
hard to understand without experiencing them first-hand. It is 
the stark isolation of the Antarctic environment that makes the 
report's findings particularly concerning.
    According to the report, insufficient safety precautions, 
failures in broadband connectivity, and a lack of clear, 
transparent reporting structures have all contributed to an 
unsafe culture at the Antarctic research facilities.
    The science community faces unique challenges when it comes 
to addressing harassment, particularly in remote field 
stations. Individuals working in science who are affected by 
sexual harassment and discrimination can suffer long-term harm 
to their education and careers, as well as to their mental and 
physical well-being.
    While we can't lose sight of the individual cost, we must 
also think about the cost to our society and the economy as a 
whole. Engaging more women in STEM studies and careers is 
essential to American competitiveness.
    If we want to have the strongest STEM workforce in the 
world, it is vital that our research environments foster a safe 
and accountable culture.
    I want to acknowledge some of the efforts that have taken 
place at NSF since the report's release to improve the culture 
at the U.S. Antarctic Program.
    NSF took positive steps by commissioning this report and 
seriously addressing its findings. I'm pleased that NSF plans 
to increase training and vetting for individuals going to the 
ice, and to establish a reporting hotline.
    I urge NSF to remain attentive to these issues not only in 
Antarctica, but also at other remote field work environments.
    The Science Committee has worked on a bipartisan basis to 
address issues such as harassment and discrimination in 
science. Products of our work were included in the recently 
passed CHIPS and Science Act.
    However, the report we are discussing today demonstrates 
that there is still more work to do, particularly on addressing 
issues of harassment in the field.
    Today's hearing will raise some difficult questions--many 
without easy answers.
    How do we address these issues both fairly and safely? How 
do we navigate policies for remote field environments that are 
vastly different from each other? How do we navigate different 
command structures between NSF contractors, military members, 
and visiting scientists?
    I hope our witnesses and other stakeholders can help us 
navigate these questions. I am looking forward to hearing more 
about how we can address the findings in the report to ensure 
the Antarctic research program is safe for everyone living and 
working on the ice.
    If I may take a moment of personal privilege. As this is 
our last hearing together, I'd like to take this opportunity to 
thank the Chairwoman for her leadership and partnership on this 
issue, as well as many others. It has truly been an honor to 
serve with you and I wish you all the best in your retirement.
    Again, thank you Chairwoman Johnson for holding this 
hearing and I yield back the balance of my time.

    Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much.
    If there are Members who wish to submit additional opening 
statements, your statements will be added to the record at this 
point.
    At this time, I'd like to introduce our witnesses. Our 
first witness, Dr. Karen Marrongelle, the Chief Operating 
Officer of the National Science Foundation. In this role, she 
oversees operations of the agency and its missions. Prior to 
this role, she served as Assistant Director of Education and 
Human Resources Directorate at the NSF and as the Dean of the 
College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Portland State 
University.
    Our next witness, Ms. Kathleen Naeher, Ms. Naeher is the 
Chief Operating Officer of the Civil Group of Leidos. In this 
role, she works with the Civil Group leadership team to drive 
operational performance and alignment with the annual operating 
plan and market strategies. Prior to this position, she served 
for more than 35 years at the Central Intelligence Agency 
(CIA), most recently as CIA's Associate Deputy Director of 
Digital Innovation.
    Our third witness Dr. Angela Olinto, Dr. Olinto is the Dean 
of Division of Physical Sciences and the Albert Michelson 
Distinguished Service Professor at the University of Chicago, 
which manages the South Pole Telescope. At the University of 
Chicago she was the first woman to receive tenure in the 
Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics and the first woman to 
become Chair of any department in the Physical Sciences 
Division, and the first woman to become Dean of Physical 
Sciences Division.
    Our next witness, Dr. Anne Kelly, Dr. Kelly is presently 
the Deputy Director of the Nature Conservancy in her home State 
of Alaska. Prior to this role, she served on-site as the 
Director of Research and Education at Cal State University's 
Desert Studies Center. She also served as the Director of UC's 
(University of California's) Merced field station at Yosemite 
and Sequoia National Parks. Dr. Kelly gained experience 
fighting harassment in STEM as a board member of the 
Organization of Biological Field Stations, a team member of the 
ADVANCEGeo project, and through advocacy and policy development 
at the USGS (United States Geological Survey) and several 
universities.
    Our witnesses should know that you will each have five 
minutes for your spoken testimony. Your written testimony will 
be included in the record for the hearing. So when you have 
completed your spoken testimony, we will begin questions. Each 
Member will have five minutes to question the panel.
    Dr. Marrongelle?

              TESTIMONY OF DR. KAREN MARRONGELLE,

                    CHIEF OPERATING OFFICER,

                  NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION

    Dr. Marrongelle. Good afternoon, Chairwoman Johnson, 
Ranking Member Lucas, and Members of the Committee. My name is 
Dr. Karen Marrongelle, and I'm the Chief Operating Officer at 
the National Science Foundation.
    I would like to start by thanking this Committee for the 
continued strong support of the NSF. Your leadership in passing 
the CHIPS & Science Act will ensure that the United States 
remains the global leader in research and innovation for 
generations to come.
    We have to recognize that in order to fully engage this 
Nation's incredible talent, we must ensure that our research 
environments, from the lab to the most remote field sites, are 
free of harassment and provide the safety and support necessary 
to allow ingenuity and innovation to flourish. NSF does not 
tolerate harassment in any research setting. It is because of 
our deep commitment to this principle that NSF commissioned the 
``Sexual Assault and Harassment Prevention and Response'' 
report for NSF's U.S. Antarctic Program in order to address and 
understand what is not working. We are proud to be a leader in 
taking proactive approaches to address harassment, and we will 
continue to endeavor to eliminate sexual harassment within the 
science and engineering community. The report is deeply 
troubling and demonstrates a need to fundamentally change the 
culture and practices that govern research in Antarctica.
    As a female mathematician and leader in STEM, I know too 
well the challenges individuals can face as a result of actions 
from some members of the scientific community. There are few 
locations that are as important to our understanding of the 
world around us as the Antarctic continent. Since 1956, 
Americans have been studying the Antarctic and its interactions 
with the rest of the planet and taking advantage of the unique 
atmosphere to study the cosmos. The community consists of 
almost 3,000 people who travel to the ice every year, from 
researchers to support personnel and contractors, staff from 
multiple Federal agencies, and military personnel. NSF is 
extremely proud of the U.S. Antarctic Program and the people 
who make up this incredible community. However, the report also 
showed us that we need to take swift action to address very 
troubling reports of assault and harassment and an environment 
that was hostile for many individuals.
    Shortly after receiving the report, NSF leadership directed 
an agencywide response to take the actions necessary to 
systematically address the findings, implement near-term 
solutions, and evaluate longer-term needs and actions. Most 
importantly, the safety of all deployers was and continues to 
be our highest priority. Each of the steps NSF has taken, and 
our progress to date is detailed in my written testimony. 
However, I would like to highlight just a few.
    First, we took swift action to reassess the terms of NSF's 
Antarctic Support Contract (ASC). This action included the 
negotiation and implementation of new contract terms with 
Leidos. Those modifications are aimed at ensuring ethical 
conduct, screening of personnel, and oversight. In addition, 
NSF established a sexual assault and harassment prevention and 
response support office in order to provide the necessary 
resources to support deployed personnel on matters relating to 
sexual assault and harassment and to remove barriers and 
provide an independent line of reporting for victims of sexual 
assault and harassment matters.
    NSF is enacting a multifaceted plan that targets 
prevention, uses up-to-date training methods, and addresses the 
complexity of reporting incidents where multiple employers and 
agencies intersect. In addition, we are working to create an 
environment which empowers deployers to speak up when they see 
or experience sexual assault or harassment and empowers 
management to take swift and appropriate action.
    We will be conducting annual climate surveys to help us 
understand if our actions are contributing to a culture shift 
and what, if anything, we need to change. NSF will continue to 
take steps to ensure that all research environments are free of 
harassment in any form and that research can thrive in 
collaborative, supportive, and safe environments.
    Transformational change requires a community effort. We can 
set the tone for the changes we expect to see, but we need 
partners in realizing our vision. NSF is committed to working 
with the entire community to take the steps necessary to 
eliminate sexual assault and harassment at our Antarctic 
stations, vessels, and field camps. We appreciate the continued 
strong support of this Committee and look forward to working 
with you to address this important issue. Thank you.
    [The prepared statement of Dr. Marrongelle follows:]
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    Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much.
    Ms. Kathleen Naeher.

               TESTIMONY OF MS. KATHLEEN NAEHER,

       CHIEF OPERATING OFFICER OF THE CIVIL GROUP, LEIDOS

    Ms. Naeher. Chairwoman Johnson, Ranking Member Lucas, and 
Members of the Committee, my name is Kathleen Naeher, and I'm 
the Chief Operating Officer in the Civil Group at Leidos. 
Leidos appreciates the Committee holding this important hearing 
and is deeply committed to working in partnership with the 
National Science Foundation and this Committee to address 
concerns about sexual harassment for those deployed to 
Antarctica.
    I help to oversee our work in Antarctica and in connection 
with the Antarctic Support Contract. I have been closely 
involved in our efforts to address the important issues the 
Committee is exploring today. Let me be crystal clear. There is 
no place for harassment of any sort in any workplace, be it on 
ice or elsewhere.
    As a company with a long history of providing technology, 
engineering, and scientific experience to our customers, 
including the Federal Government, Leidos is committed to doing 
everything possible to provide a safe and secure workplace 
wherever we operate. Since 2018, Leidos has been recognized by 
Ethisphere as one of the world's most ethical companies.
    Leidos is proud to partner with the NSF to support the 
United States Antarctic Program and the important work being 
conducted. As a prime contractor to NSF, Leidos does not 
oversee or perform scientific research. Instead, our role is to 
provide the support services that allow the scientists on the 
ice to do their work. The jobs Leidos and its subcontractors do 
represent a wide range of trades and skills, including 
engineers, waste management, construction workers, medical 
professionals, fire and rescue, cooks and kitchen workers, 
janitorial services, logistics specialists, mechanics, air 
support, finance, HVAC (heating, ventilation, and air 
conditioning) specialists, and many others. We essentially run 
a small town, all to support the science being conducted there.
    Before coming to Leidos, I spent over 30 years at the CIA, 
where I worked in difficult and demanding settings around the 
world, including in multiple war zones. Even when compared to 
those locations, Antarctica presents complex and unique 
challenges, which I saw firsthand when I was on ice last month. 
Given the extremely remote and harsh conditions, working in 
Antarctica is difficult and isolating. Connectivity is limited, 
making communications difficult. Because people working in this 
remote environment share living and working spaces for months 
at a time, it is hard to have private time or separation from 
your coworkers. Further complicating the environment, there are 
a number of different stakeholders operating alongside each 
other. While a number of people work in the same setting or 
location, they report to different employers or agencies even 
with each with its own requirements, expectations, and policies 
for addressing workplace matters on ice.
    Though the complicated nature of the work environment 
presents unique complexities as it relates to workplace safety, 
including with respect to preventing and reporting harassment, 
we take all reports of potential misconduct seriously. Since 
becoming NSF's prime contractor in Antarctica in 2016, Leidos 
has taken a number of steps to improve the culture and 
conditions on ice and to foster a safe and protective 
workplace. For example, in 2019 Leidos strengthened 
requirements relating to prevention and response training for 
sexual harassment and assault, including providing ally 
training to station leadership and subcontract line managers. 
In 2020, Leidos deployed a full-time counselor onsite to 
provide counseling services to all people deployed on ice, 
including grantees, NSF, and military personnel. Leidos added 
workshops addressing workplace culture in 2020, and in 2021, we 
established the ASC Inclusion Council and our ASC HR (human 
resources) managers received certifications as victims' 
advocates.
    After receiving the SAHPR report this summer, we continued 
our efforts to improve the culture and conditions on ASC in 
coordination with the NSF. This issue has the attention of the 
highest levels of Leidos. In particular, the company 
established a task force in July 2022 to address the specific 
concerns raised in the SAHPR report. The resulting action plan 
includes multiple ongoing workstreams focused on enhancing 
harassment prevention training; encouraging reporting of 
concerns; improving physical safety, including for grantees 
working in the field; and collaborating with their subcontract 
teams to strengthen and improve consistency in report--and 
responding to reports of sexual harassment and assault.
    In conclusion, I was inspired during my recent visit to see 
the level of dedication to the mission among the staff in 
Antarctica. Leidos shares this commitment, both to the mission 
and to ensuring a safe environment for those living and working 
there. We are pleased to partner with NSF to continue to make 
progress in this area so that the important scientific work in 
Antarctica can continue free from harassment of any kind.
    I would like to reiterate my thanks to the Committee for 
addressing this important issue and to Chairwoman Johnson for 
her leadership throughout her career. We at Leidos wish you the 
best in your upcoming retirement. Thank you.
    [The prepared statement of Ms. Naeher follows:]
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    Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much.
    Dr. Angela Olinto.

               TESTIMONY OF DR. ANGELA V. OLINTO,

             DEAN OF THE PHYSICAL SCIENCES DIVISION

             AND ALBERT A. MICHELSON DISTINGUISHED

            SERVICE PROFESSOR, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO

    Dr. Olinto. Thank you, Chairwoman Johnson, Ranking Member 
Lucas, and Members of the Committee. Thank you for your 
leadership and for inviting me to share the importance of 
building a safer Antarctic research environment from a U.S. 
research university's perspective. I'm Angela Olinto, the Dean 
of the Physical Sciences Division at the University of Chicago.
    Some of the field-defining projects in our division can 
only be done in the Antarctic continent. These projects range 
from small teams studying the ice sheets in Antarctica, the 
world-leading astronomical observatories at the South Pole, and 
sponsored scientific balloon by NASA (National Aeronautics and 
Space Administration). NASA launches our instruments from 
McMurdo because it enables them to fly for weeks to months 
around the Antarctic continent following the polar vortex 
winds. The South Pole is one of the best places on Earth to 
study the universe because it is about 9,300 feet in elevation 
with a very dry and thin atmosphere and 6 months of darkness 
during the polar winter.
    For decades, researchers from the University of Chicago and 
many other institutions have led observatories at the pole to 
significantly advanced the field of cosmology and astroparticle 
physics. Today, our researchers operate the powerful South Pole 
Telescope with its third-generation camera and are part of the 
impressive IceCube Neutrino Observatory.
    Two of the top priorities from the most recent decadal 
survey in astronomy and astrophysics conducted by the National 
Academy of Sciences will be located at the South Pole, CMB-S4 
and IceCube-Gen2. These work to understand the earliest moments 
of the universe and the highest energy events in the universe. 
These cutting-edge research projects could not be done without 
the continued support of Congress, NSF, NASA, and the U.S. 
Antarctic Program. The wide scientific community and human 
curiosity in general are extremely grateful to these 
institutions for supporting these unique opportunities to 
understand our origins, our place in the universe, and the 
dynamics and limits of the planet we call home.
    Given our strong commitment to supporting an inclusive 
environment for the diverse set of creative minds who want to 
contribute to these groundbreaking scientific efforts, it was 
with great concern that we learned about the findings of the 
``Sexual Assault/Harassment Prevention and Response'' report. 
As a woman in a historically male-dominated field, the 
unwelcome environment for women in STEM has been an important 
issue throughout my career. When I was a Ph.D. at MIT 
(Massachusetts Institute of Technology), we were only 3 percent 
women. Now I'm happy to report that women Ph.D. students in our 
division have reached 35 percent, and women faculty are about 
20 percent. Women scientists have become leaders of many of the 
field-defining efforts at remote locations like Antarctica. We 
need to work harder to eradicate sexual harassment and any 
other kind of discrimination, harassment, or assault in STEM 
fields.
    When I learned about the report, I consulted with some of 
our researchers about their own experiences in the Antarctic 
continent. Unfortunately, they were not surprised by the report 
findings. We commend NSF Office of Polar Program for engaging 
with subject matter experts to examine the sexual harassment 
and assault concerns in the USAP community and to identify 
corrective actions to improve the climate and trust in the 
community. We agree with the recommendations to improve 
communications, increase engagement, enhance education and 
training, strengthen reporting infrastructure and 
accountability, provide support to victims, and probe more 
deeply into policies and mechanisms aimed at prevention.
    Universities and research teams also need to do more. The 
potential for unacceptable behavior can occur in other remote 
locations that share the characteristics of the Antarctic field 
work, geographical isolation, limited communication, and 
unclear hierarchical power dynamics. We want to reiterate to 
all our community that discrimination, harassment, or assault 
in any setting is unacceptable and unlawful. All our community 
members are expected to abide by the university's policy on 
discrimination, harassment, and sexual misconduct while 
performing remote fieldwork.
    We are working to better prepare our community to be in 
remote locations. We now have a remote field research website 
with resources. We will provide some training for team leaders 
and ombudspeople that--on best practices before their trips. 
Improved communications between these points of contact and the 
institutions involved in the remote field research is very 
important for changing the culture and preventing unacceptable 
and unlawful behaviors such as discrimination, harassment, or 
assault.
    The astonishing discoveries that can only be done in remote 
locations will continue to captivate the public and inspire 
future generations of diverse minds to study scientific and 
technical fields that will further enrich the prosperity of 
this great Nation. We need to do our best to provide the most 
welcoming and safe environments for all involved in expanding 
our scientific knowledge.
    Thank you for listening. I'll be pleased to answer 
questions. Thanks.
    [The prepared statement of Dr. Olinto follows:]
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    Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much.
    And our final witness, Dr. Anne Kelly.

         TESTIMONY OF DR. ANNE KELLY, DEPUTY DIRECTOR,

             THE NATURE CONSERVANCY ALASKA CHAPTER

    Dr. Kelly. Hello, and thank you to Representative Johnson 
and the Committee for inviting me today. And I thank you all 
for your leadership and effort toward making a safer workplace 
for scientists. I'm Anne Kelly, the Deputy Director for the 
Nature Conservancy Alaska.
    I'm here to tell you that Antarctica is not an isolated 
problem, and I'm here to share with you how we can make 
meaningful change to prevent this. Surveys show that most field 
researchers experience harassment or assault. Harassment in the 
field can cause profound damage to scientists' health, psyche, 
and careers we've heard about today. Harassers more frequently 
target junior scientists, women, racial minorities, and queer 
scientists, driving underrepresented scientists out of their 
research careers. Harassment damages the potential of diverse 
scientists and the endeavor of science itself.
    The conditions that promote harassment in Antarctica are 
found in nearly every small field camp, large field station, 
and ocean research vessel. Strong hierarchies, remoteness and 
isolation, difficult physical conditions, macho work cultures, 
and a lack of institutional support are the norm for field 
researchers everywhere. Harassment in the field takes many 
forms. The horrific harassment and assault in the Antarctic 
report is only the tip of the iceberg. Far more common are the 
daily aggressions of insults, exclusions, and threats. 
Scientists are told to toughen up, fall in line, and stay quiet 
to prove their worth.
    As a researcher for the U.S. Geological Survey, my 
colleagues and I investigated anti-harassment policies. For 
months, our emails to EEOC (Equal Employment Opportunity 
Commission) went unanswered. Our voicemails to whistleblower 
hotlines were never returned. Support websites were outdated 
and broken. Policies to support field scientists were 
nonexistent, so we created a few of our own. While Director of 
three remote field stations, I led several international 
initiatives to change field culture and to fight harassment, 
including development of policies for dozens of field research 
stations. I also collaborate with a geoscience team to train 
academics nationwide to fight harassment in field research.
    My colleagues and I have been pushing change from the 
grassroots by developing our own tools to help us survive. 
Ultimately, accountability for real change lies with the 
institutional leaders. To provide leadership with guidance for 
change, the NSF funded Dr. Kristen Yarincik, then at the Center 
for Ocean Leadership, and myself to lead development of robust 
recommendations for institutional change in field and ocean 
research. We convened 70 experts to develop recommendations for 
preventing and responding to harassment in field science.
    The group identified 52 best practices for institutions to 
address harassment in the field. The recommendations provide 
meaningful results through institutional structural change 
rather than relying on your good intentions. Findings targeted 
four major topics. First, field climate and culture change; 
second, accountability; and third, policy development; and the 
fourth, reporting.
    So for field climate and culture change, hostile climate is 
the greatest factor in enabling harassment and assault. 
Behavioral standards must be defined, communicated, and 
normalized, much like job safety standards. These standards 
must be included in hiring, evaluations, promotion, and tenure. 
Poor behavior must be acted on. As with other safety 
assessments, conduct risk assessments around harassment and 
assault.
    For accountability, permissive environments lead to more 
harassment and a reluctance of targets to report. Institutions 
must hold research leaders accountable for safe and equitable 
work environments. Leadership must develop protocols for safe 
and equitable practices. They must train workers and hold them 
accountable for those practices; create, publicize, and enforce 
consequences; create protections for targets of harassment and 
repair harms; hold all relevant institutional jurisdictions 
responsible.
    Third, policy must set explicit standards for behavior in 
the field for reporting and recordkeeping of incidents and for 
clear consequences for harassment. Safety nets must be created 
for targets of harassment. Policies that are meaningfully 
enforced give targets incentive to report and remove implicit 
permission for harassment and other bad behavior.
    Finally, reporting: Reporting in remote research is 
challenging due to unclear jurisdictions and the lack of 
communications reporting avenues. Allow multiple mechanisms for 
communication for unrestricted private use, like making radios 
and sat phones available to contact help. Have multiple avenues 
reporting--for reporting, including multiple contacts onsite 
and offsite from all jurisdictions. Create reporting and 
recordkeeping for minor and major transgressions.
    Best practices don't rely on retraining individuals' 
attitudes and asking them to do better. Good institutional 
structures and incentives make it possible to do the right 
thing. Invest real resources to build and support these 
critical institutional structures.
    Our culture of harassment is as pervasive as the air we 
breathe, so it can be hard to imagine something different. I 
urge this Committee to push research institutions so the 
scientific community can thrive and rise to the many challenges 
facing our society and our planet. Thank you.
    [The prepared statement of Dr. Kelly follows:]
    
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    Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much.
    At this point, we will begin our first round of questions, 
and the Chair recognizes herself for five minutes.
    Dr. Marrongelle, this report identified a number of 
shortcomings in the USAP. One of the primary concerns is the 
National Science Foundation's access to information involving 
cross-jurisdictional incidents. There's a troubling 
profession--perception that NSF has been willfully unaware of 
the problem. Some feel NSF has been hiding behind contract for 
HR policies to avoid accountability. Now, I understand that NSF 
has since taken steps to modify its contract with Leidos, but 
in my view, more needs to be done.
    As the Federal agency charged with managing USAP, NSF 
should have the information and leverage it needs to ensure the 
environment is safe for all participants. Do you see the 
upcoming recompete for the Antarctica Support Contract as an 
opportunity to make significant changes to the contract terms? 
And if so, what changes are you exploring?
    Dr. Marrongelle. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman, for that 
question. Yes. As you know, we have already put into place 
contract modifications with the existing Leidos contract in 
response to what we heard from the SAHPR report. As we think 
forward to the re-competition, we're going to take the lessons 
learned from the modifications that we made and in the 
intervening upcoming months, we'll look at how those 
modifications are taking place, and the impact that they're 
having on personnel vetting, on response times to allegations, 
and, importantly, on the management of subcontractors. We 
intend to continue to learn over the next several months and 
roll those learnings into the next re-compete of the next 
Antarctic contract.
    Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much. Ms. Naeher, is 
Leidos open to firmer contract terms that clarify your 
responsibility for maintaining a safe environment. What are you 
planning, and what is Leidos planning to compete for that 
contract and--that expires in 2025?
    Ms. Naeher. Chairwoman, so we partner and collaborate with 
NSF consistently throughout to--and we're--to make sure we have 
a safe environment for all our employees. We're open to 
anything that creates a safer and healthier environment. We 
would show the things that we've already started, the HR 
consortium, the increased contact with our subcontractors, the 
on-ice counselor, the things that we've done in the past and 
that we continue to do in partnership with NSF so that NSF 
would be confident in our ability to create that environment on 
ice.
    Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much. Any further 
testimony that anyone would like to give related to this issue? 
Well, thank you very much. I now recognize Mr. Lucas.
    Mr. Lucas. Thank you, Madam Chair.
    Dr. Marrongelle, thank you for appearing before us today on 
behalf of the NSF. I'd like to ask you about the NFS--NSF's 
strategy to address the findings of the report. What short-term 
actions has NF-NSF taken in response to the finding of the 
report?
    Dr. Marrongelle. Thank you for that question. We have eight 
actions that we are focused on in the short term, and I'll 
review those. The first--I must say that our primary focus is 
to take care of victims, and so these actions are victim-
focused. So first is to outline a single communication point at 
NSF for sexual assault and harassment matters. And to that end, 
we have stood up an Office of Sexual Assault and Harassment 
Prevention and Response within the foundation. In the short 
term, this office is strategically focused on the Antarctic 
continent, but we intend to broaden this office to take a 
further look at all research vessels, field sites, and 
infrastructure anywhere where science is taking place.
    The next is specific resources for victims on the ice. We 
now have an on-ice advocate whose job on the ice at McMurdo 
Station is to provide counseling and support specifically for 
sexual assault and harassment. We've received already reports 
back that the presence of that advocate has been game changing 
for the work that's going on there.
    Third, we have an increased presence in visits to the ice. 
The on-ice advocate, in addition to some of senior personnel 
from NSF, conducted seven listening sessions for community 
input to further gather information about our plans moving 
forward and the gaps in those plans, what we need to change 
moving forward.
    Fourth, we've increased the vetting for any personnel who 
are traveling to the ice. This was part of what we did with the 
contract modifications but also our internal processes. So at 
this point, individuals who are traveling to the ice receive 
vetting that's equivalent to Federal employees.
    Fifth is accountability. We've established points of 
contact with senior leadership at all of our partner 
institutions, Leidos, and other Federal agencies who have a 
presence and provide us services on the ice. The reason for 
that is so we have someone that we can go to at the top in 
addition to staff members so that if issues are coming up that 
are not getting resolved, we have the commitment and buy-in 
from top-level leadership at these organizations.
    We've also improved training. We have new training modules 
for all individuals who travel to Antarctica. There's a focus 
this year on bystander intervention, and we will be reviewing 
the impact of those modules and revising as necessary moving 
forward. We've already received some great input on how to do 
that.
    We've also enhanced physical safety measures. One of the 
key findings from the SAHPR report pointed out some of the 
limitations of the physical infrastructure in Antarctica. And 
so, for instance, we are ensuring by the end of this season 
that keyholes, or peepholes, will be installed in all doors at 
all stations for living quarters. We've also enhanced the 
security clearances for those who have access to master keys. 
We have instituted additional satellite phones for those in 
remote field stations so that at least two of those 
communication devices are sent out with every field team.
    And then finally, the Director has instituted a taskforce 
on sexual assault and harassment at NSF. I chair that task 
force. We meet weekly. Again, currently, our focus is acutely 
on the situation in Antarctica. As we start to see the effects 
of what we've been doing in Antarctica to make changes, we'll 
be revising--but then also broadening--this to other field 
stations and institutes.
    Mr. Lucas. Thank you. And in my remaining time, Ms. Naeher, 
can you describe what specific policies or procedures that 
Leidos has changed since the release of the report?
    Ms. Naeher. Thank you. So Leidos has always had strong 
policies and procedures in place to make sure the workplace is 
safe and harassment-free. So since the report, we reinvigorated 
our HR Consortium, which was a group of all the different 
subcontractors, just to ensure that everybody was applying 
policies consistently across the board, and we--it was a way 
for us to share best practices and also to increase that 
communication that the report showed was needed.
    We also work very closely on implementing some of the 
changes that NSF has just identified, and we can--we'll 
continue to do that.
    Mr. Lucas. Thank you, Madam Chair. Looks like my time has 
expired.
    Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much.
    Now, Ms. Sherrill.
    Ms. Sherrill. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.
    You know, I found that answer a bit unsatisfactory from Ms. 
Naeher that Leidos has always had strong policies in place to 
make sure the workplace is harassment-free because obviously 
those policies didn't work to make sure the workplace was 
harassment-free, so I definitely think we need to move in a 
better direction. And I think the first part of that is 
admitting that we have a problem here.
    From my time in the military, we do have a lot of places 
that we operate in the military that are very isolated, and 
we've had problems historically. Is there training? Because I 
do worry that some of these research scientists maybe have not 
had the position of leadership or management that they are now 
being put in to ensure because a lot of this starts at the top, 
as we all know. If you have a good command structure, that 
often can protect people below. Is there good training going on 
to ensure that new leaders understand their role and can ensure 
that people below them are protected and safe?
    Dr. Marrongelle. I'll start with that. It's such a great 
question. We've specifically included bystander training in our 
training materials this year, as I had mentioned, and some of 
what we've learned from the listening sessions is that we need 
to, moving forward, have individualized training for different 
sets of individuals on the ice. For instance, for managers and 
supervisors, what they can do to recognize retaliation if 
that's happening, to combat retaliation if that's happening and 
then similarly, for our senior scientists who are leading 
research teams, so we know that we have more work to do in that 
space. I think some of the actions that my colleagues have 
pointed out are really moving in that direction, and we have 
some great models from the University of Chicago for how we can 
provide that training to not only the senior level PIs 
(principal investigators) but also graduate students and 
postdocs and others who may need to take on leadership roles as 
they are traveling in teams to the ice.
    Dr. Olinto. I think that one of the challenges that we were 
talking just before this hearing is the communications. I think 
we have infrastructures and institutions to address some of the 
issues, but when you have a small team in an isolated place, it 
can become unclear who to go to. And many things don't get 
talked to, and there's an atmosphere that that's the way it is, 
right? So we need to break that cycle. And we have been doing 
on our end, making sure there's always an obvious point of 
contact. Sometimes it's the PI, but sometimes the PI is not 
there. Sometimes it's a postdoc, sometimes it's a senior 
graduate student, to make sure that within the science 
community we have the person who will be watching and will be 
able to know what to do.
    And then given--hopefully, nothing happens. But if 
something happens, they know exactly how to contact NSF or 
Leidos or whoever is involved in that situation. So I think the 
communication lines, we are working hard to make that more 
clear, and Antarctica is a really good place to focus. But this 
happens in other places, too, and so as an institution, we want 
to broaden that ability to understand your responsibility. We 
are all responsible.
    Ms. Sherrill. And it sounds like you're doing some training 
to help leaders know who to go to. Does every individual know 
who they go to? So for--if, for example, I experience sexual 
assault or harassment, would I know exactly who I could report 
that to to receive help?
    Dr. Olinto. Let me answer on the scientist side. I think 
that that wasn't true before this report. There is a 
camaraderie between the groups that go together, but nobody was 
necessarily responsible, at least within small groups, to be 
the one except for the PI, but the PI might not be there. So 
that's one of the things we're fixing, right? So I think that 
is crucial. But there are many other communities that have, 
like the contractors and others, but in the science roles, for 
sure.
    Dr. Kelly. Yes, I want to add, too--sorry--that often it's 
the leadership themselves that are conducting the harassment. 
And, you know, one of the necessary support structures that 
needs to be built here is that there are alternative reporting 
mechanisms and that the leadership of any one team is not the 
gatekeeper for reporting.
    Ms. Sherrill. I think that's a great point. I think there 
has to be an understanding of who needs to be reported to but 
then alternatives to that. And it sounds as if, while the 
scientific community is taking this very seriously, I do have 
some concerns about Leidos and their contractors. And if they 
have a plan for any of these things, I have not heard that 
today. But it looks like my time is about to expire, so I yield 
back.
    Chairwoman Johnson. Mr. Posey.
    Mr. Posey. Thank you, Madam Chair. And thank you also for 
your years of leadership, fair and handed leadership. I don't 
know anyone who doesn't appreciate it.
    Dr. Marrongelle, a number of witnesses' testimonies 
discussed the presence of other Federal agencies on the ice. 
Could you provide some insight into how the National Science 
Foundation coordinates with those other Federal agencies like 
NASA and NOAA, as well as Federal contractors, when making 
policies on the ice?
    Dr. Marrongelle. Yes, absolutely. In this specific 
situation, the Director and myself, we have reached out to our 
equivalents at the other Federal agencies, so specifically, 
NASA, NOAA, the Air Force, and the Navy. We have talked with 
them about the seriousness of the findings in this report and 
given them insight into the steps that we're taking moving 
forward. We've also asked them to identify members of their 
staffs that can act as points of contact specifically when and 
if allegations of sexual assault and harassment come in. 
Generally, we do have ongoing relationships with program 
managers at the other Federal agencies. As we are developing 
new policies, new procedures, we have ongoing consultation with 
them.
    Also, add that our colleagues have been wonderful in 
sharing their findings and best practices in these areas of 
sexual assault and harassment with us. We are currently 
reviewing those documents and understanding what we can do--so 
we don't need to reinvent the wheel--what we can take from our 
partner agencies and apply those learnings to the situation.
    Mr. Posey. Thank you. As a follow up, has the National 
Science Foundation shared the ``Sexual Assault/Harassment 
Prevention and Response'' report and its findings with other 
Federal agencies?
    Dr. Marrongelle. Yes. And in fact, this is on our website, 
so anyone from the public can access it.
    Mr. Posey. Excellent. And how is the National Science 
Foundation planning to coordinate on the implementation of the 
new policies resulting from the report with other Federal 
agencies in Antarctica?
    Dr. Marrongelle. Right. Those points of contact are 
critical. It was really important to the Director and I that we 
set the tone from the top that NSF has no tolerance for 
harassment and that we expect the same of our partners. We'll 
be coordinating primarily through those points of contact at 
the more programmatic levels and throughout the agencies. And, 
if needed, the Director and I will step in to get involved if 
that's called for.
    Mr. Posey. That's excellent. I see my time has expired. 
Madam Chair, I yield back.
    Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much.
    Ms. Stevens is recognized.
    Ms. Stevens. Thank you. And before I start my line of 
questioning, I've waited a long time to do this. When 
Chairwoman Johnson announced her retirement, the following 
Committee hearing everyone celebrated her, but I decided I was 
going to wait to the last Committee hearing of the 117th 
Congress that she was chairing to salute and recognize her 
incredible leadership as Chair of the Science, Space, and 
Technology Committee. It has been my deep honor to serve 
alongside you, Madam Chair, and as your Vice Chair, and we will 
forever look back on the imprint that you have made on this 
Nation and for women in STEM. Thank you.
    And with that, Ms. Naeher, OK, this hearing is an 
opportunity to discuss the issue of sexual harassment. And the 
SAHPR report, it was shocking to read. And obviously, it should 
have been a wakeup call for you, the National Science 
Foundation, and anyone that deploys people to the Arctic, and 
certainly appreciate you making an appearance. But I think you 
got 500 words here maybe in your testimony, and so I'm a little 
disappointed by the level of detail that you have offered in 
your statement. And you just touched upon the steps that Leidos 
has been taking since reviewing the report. So I just wanted to 
give you an opportunity to be a little bit more specific here. 
What are you doing to encourage reporting? Have you addressed 
the distrust of HR by altering the reporting pipeline or 
offering alternative reporting procedures? And are you 
recruiting a better crop of HR personnel and training them 
properly?
    Ms. Naeher. Thank you very much for the opportunity to add 
some more here on what we've been doing. So I was very pleased 
when I was just on ice recently. There could be no doubt in 
anyone's mind how serious everyone is taking this. From the 
moment I found I was going and went through the mandatory 
training that has to take both here at Leidos and from NSF, you 
can see the concern and the effort that is being put forward to 
make sure everyone is aware of the situation and ways to combat 
harassment. This training, my cohort that had to take it to New 
Zealand was extremely engaged across the board. People were 
offering suggestions, offering what they would do as a 
bystander, making sure everyone knew different avenues that 
they could report. So the signage as well down on ice, people 
know harassment of any type is not tolerated and where to go to 
report it.
    In addition to that, we stood up an oversight board after 
the SAHPR report came out. We shared everybody's concern when 
we read the report, immediately convened a task force here as 
to how we could address it. We had people in all different work 
streams here, so we had our contracts people involved, legal 
involved, ethics, HR certainly, policy, subcontracts. We came 
up with six different work streams that we are addressing. I 
mentioned some of them in my statement. You'll see in there 
about increasing communication and collaboration with our subs, 
increasing the awareness of reporting options. And we'll 
continue to work these. This oversight board meets every two 
weeks where we gauge progress, see if we have the right actions 
that need to be completed, and then we are constantly in 
coordination with NSF sharing where we are in this aspect.
    Ms. Stevens. And can you just touch on the physical safety 
improvements that have been made?
    Ms. Naeher. Yes, so there's three, I think, major ones, 
so--and I believe NSF mentioned them, some of them. That was 
the peepholes, the door locks at all our stations, key 
management of master keys, and then one that was--more than one 
person mentioned to me when I was down on ice how appreciated 
this was, and that was an additional satellite phone to all 
teams going out. So this meant there wasn't just one phone held 
by the PI but they were--the policy was to give it to the 
highest ranking member and the lowest ranking member so they 
would each have a phone and would have ways to communicate if 
there are any issues while out in the field.
    Ms. Stevens. Great. And with that, Madam Chair, for the 
last time, I yield back.
    Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much.
    Mr. Garcia is recognized.
    Mr. Garcia. Thank you, Madam Chair. I want to commend the 
Chairwoman for her service to this beautiful Nation, salute to 
you, ma'am, for everything you've done. And to our witnesses, 
thank you. I think this is probably the most important climate 
change hearing. I've been a part of a lot of climate change 
hearings in the three years that I've been here in Congress. 
This is probably the most important, the climate where we 
actually not just adopt a zero tolerance mentality against 
harassment, discrimination, and assault, but we actually 
implement it and we hold people accountable. And I think that's 
the part that's missing in all of these conversations that 
we've had here so far.
    I appreciate that you've been introspective enough to do 
the surveys and look at the data, but I'm frankly a little 
flabbergasted that some of the results and some of the lessons 
learned are pretty low-hanging fruit that I would have thought 
we would have done before we sent anyone down to the Antarctic. 
The fact that we didn't have locks on doors and no key 
management to protect people is a little underwhelming, in my 
opinion.
    I guess my question is to Dr. Marrongelle and Ms. Naeher. 
What--how many allegations have we had of specifically 
harassment and assault?
    Dr. Marrongelle. We have information that we can share with 
the Committee.
    [The information follows:]

    The multi-jurisdictional nature of activities in Antarctica 
necessitated the development of multiple reporting mechanisms 
for both individuals and organizations on safety and behavioral 
issues. There is both direct and indirect reporting to NSF, as 
detailed below. It is possible that some of these reporting 
mechanisms overlap, or that the same complaint may be pursued 
through multiple channels.
    Direct Reporting to NSF
    1) Polar Code of Conduct
    Since 2013, every individual who is deployed to Antarctica 
through the USAP program must sign the Polar Code of Conduct, 
which requires them to abide by a series of safety and 
behavioral rules. NSF monitors and tabulates those Code of 
Conduct violations that are directly reported to the agency. 
Additionally, the Department of Defense and NSF's prime 
contractor are asked to submit an annual report to NSF that 
compiles all Polar Code of Conduct violations that constitute 
significant misconduct among individuals within their 
jurisdiction over the prior year. The reports received from our 
partners are limited in detail and cover all behavioral 
breaches including sexual assault and harassment.
    Over the past five years, there have been eight total 
harassment and sexual assault incidents reported to NSF. The 
incidents occurred randomly in that time frame. The reports 
included violations by individuals employed by contractors, 
foreign program members, and U.S. military service members. All 
reported incidents were investigated by the organizations with 
managerial oversight of the victims and accused. The 
investigation outcomes varied with the circumstances, from 
formal apology to a range of employment consequences (including 
at least three separations) and removal from Antarctica in five 
cases. All incidents involving allegations of criminal 
wrongdoing were referred to the Department of Justice. None of 
the referrals resulted in criminal charges.
    2) Reports to NSF's Office of Equity and Civil Rights 
(OECR)
    Since 2018, OECR has received nine complaints or 
communications on inappropriate sexual behavior or actions in 
the USAP program. OECR conducted follow-up on all the reports, 
which included investigations within its jurisdiction, or 
reporting to the appropriate authority with jurisdiction.
    Reporting to Other Appropriate Authorities
    Individuals or organizations may use the following channels 
for reporting that are not directly through NSF. These other 
entities have specific processes for follow-up, only some of 
which may involve direct liaison with NSF.
    1) Each employer that is a USAP partner has established 
procedures for employee reporting (typically through HR 
processes)--this includes NSF, other federal agencies, the 
Department of Defense, contractor, and academic institutions.
    2) Contractors and contract employees may report complaints 
to the Department of Labor's Office of Federal Contract 
Compliance Programs (OFCCP) or to the Equal Employment 
Opportunity Commission (EEOC), if applicable.
    3) Individuals may report complaints directly to law 
enforcement officials (such as the Special Deputy Marshall) or 
confidential support personnel (e.g., on-ice counselor, 
chaplain, or advocate).
    4) Academic employees may report complaints to their 
institution's Title IX offices.
    One of the goals of the newly established SAHPR program 
office in OECR is to build a data and reporting framework 
around these existing mechanisms to allow for timely and 
aggregate monitoring and reporting of complaints and their 
resolution.
    NSF has taken steps to improve data collection. First, 
NSF's contractor is now required to provide a quarterly 
(instead of annual) Sexual Harassment and Assault report; this 
will expedite reporting to NSF for awareness and intervention 
as appropriate. As the new support resources for the USAP 
community are rolled out (e.g., the on-ice advocate, the crisis 
hotline), we are also embedding in those contract requirements 
additional avenues to collect aggregate data on all reports or 
complaints to allow us to develop a baseline for assessment on 
an annual basis. Finally, NSF will be implementing a periodic 
climate assessment survey of the community to allow the agency 
to monitor the research environment.

    Dr. Marrongelle. In 2013, we instituted a code of conduct 
specifically to address some of the climate issues that were 
starting to arise. It's very broad, and it covers a variety of 
incidents from alcohol abuse to sexual assault, so we are happy 
to share that. This year, we are requiring our contractors and 
partner organizations to report to us on a quarterly basis 
those incidents, so we are still awaiting those reports to come 
in.
    New this year also, as I had mentioned, is the on-ice 
advocate, and so we know that individuals on the ice are taking 
advantage of the services of the on-ice advocate. Time will 
tell how--like whether those result in increased formal 
complaints and allegations, so we will need some time to match 
up the data there.
    Mr. Garcia. OK, Ms. Naeher, do you have concrete numbers on 
how many allegations have been made?
    Ms. Naeher. Yes, we've been tracking that number for----
    Mr. Garcia. What is that number?
    Ms. Naeher. I can get you the exact number. I'm happy to 
follow up on that. I can tell you that we do investigate every 
allegation that has brought--has been brought to us.
    Mr. Garcia. Right. Yes, I have no doubt about that. I guess 
my concern is if you guys are coming to testify in front of 
Congress about a severe problem and something that is a culture 
issue, you should have those numbers at your hip right now and 
be informing us of this information.
    When I was a division officer in the Navy and we had 
cultural issues, we--I implemented a zero-tolerance mentality 
for sexual harassment, sexual assault. And as a young 
lieutenant, I knew exactly how many allegations, how many 
people were charged, how many people were convicted, and how 
many people were kicked out of the Navy. When I was Vice 
President at Raytheon, I knew all of those numbers. And in this 
office, I know exactly what's going on in my office, and I hold 
those metrics very closely because it's important.
    We get what we measure, and if you guys think this is a 
problem, I would highly encourage you guys to ensure that you, 
as well as your leadership, Director Panchanathan, as well as 
Roger Krone, who's the CEO (Chief Executive Officer) of Leidos, 
be briefed on exactly what's going on down there on the ice on 
a weekly basis, on a monthly basis to know those numbers 
because you get what you measure. And if you guys don't have 
those metrics, if you're not briefing those metrics and showing 
improvement in that regard, I don't think you're really, truly 
adopting a zero-tolerance mentality. You're implementing it, 
but without the accountability, without that sort of close 
feedback loop that shows that not only are we listening to you 
but we're taking these charges forward, we're implementing 
these charges and we're holding people accountable, they're 
losing their jobs, they're being kicked off the ice, they're 
going to jail even if that's what's required for the assault, 
without that, I don't know how you say you have learned your 
lesson.
    And I would strongly encourage you the next time you come 
to Congress to have those metrics available for you. That's 
what zero tolerance looks like. You have our support. We will 
bend over backwards to give you whatever funding is necessary, 
but we need you guys to make this the No. 1 key performance 
parameter on any--anything that you're doing. Safety is No. 1, 
and if you can't look your employees and Leidos employees in 
the eyes and say that you can't guarantee that they will not be 
raped or sexually harassed, then safety is not your No. 1 
priority. This was a problem we had in the DOD (Department of 
Defense). We're still going through those growing pains. But 
this is very near and dear to my heart because we have to--if 
we're going to ask people to go down to serve their country in 
any capacity, whether it's Antarctica or overseas, we've got to 
make sure that we know these metrics cold and be prepared to 
hold people accountable.
    I'm out of time. I yield back.
    Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much.
    Mr. McNerney.
    Mr. McNerney. Well, I thank the Chairwoman. And I want to 
join my colleagues in thanking you for your leadership over the 
years, thoughtful, and you've made a difference, so thank you.
    I went to Antarctica in 2014 with this Committee, and it 
was a profound experience. I'd go back anytime except maybe 
their winters. But, Dr. Marrongelle, thank you for your 
testimony this morning. The NSF has a pretty good recording--
reporting requirement for harassment. But did the NSF stop 
short of requiring that same level of reporting for its 
contractors?
    Dr. Marrongelle. Right. Our term and condition is one that 
we're very proud of. We've been a leader in this area. We are 
taking a look at how we can work with contractors moving 
forward if we need to institute something like a term and 
condition for contractors, if we need some change in law. We've 
certainly been in communication with your staff, and we'll 
continue to do that. So we're still unpacking what's needed 
moving forward to ensure that we have the same level of 
reporting and accountability that we do for our grantees, for 
our contractors.
    Mr. McNerney. Thank you. Ms. Naeher, you mentioned that the 
McMurdo was a small city, and it is, and there's a lot of 
activity there. Any city has some bad actors in it. But in 
McMurdo people can't just leave. And there's really no 
visible--at least when I was there--sort of law enforcement 
authority, so people may feel trapped in that environment. And 
so getting people to go there to work as contractors may be 
difficult. What are the positions that are hardest to fill for 
that assignment?
    Ms. Naeher. You know, it's interesting you say that. And we 
certainly do have some hard-to-fill positions. Firefighters are 
routinely difficult to fill. But it was interesting when I was 
down there is that I met very few people who it was either 
their first time there or that they hadn't planned on coming 
back again. So despite the harsh environment working there, 
there is that dedication to mission and people want to 
continuously come back year after year, season after season to 
support that mission. We do recruit heavily, and we use our 
Leidos recruitment team, as well as working with our 
subcontractors to fill the difficult positions.
    Mr. McNerney. Well, thank you.
    Dr. Kelly, thank you for your thoughtful and comprehensive 
recommendations. And if these are implemented, it's clear to me 
that they will make a big difference. In particular, I liked 
the behavioral standards, establishment and dissemination and 
training in that I think that would be the most effective of 
the many good recommendations you made. Do you have a comment 
about that?
    Dr. Kelly. Yes, sure, I think it's really important to 
address this type of behavior before it rises to the level of 
illegality. Research shows over and over again that hostile 
work environments, while they may not be even at the level of 
illegality, enable far more severe behavior. When we are 
working in remote research sites, it's totally appropriate to 
ask for a higher standard of behavior both on and off the 
clock. And, you know, if we were able to set those norms and 
enforce those norms on a regular basis, I think it would go a 
long way toward changing the culture.
    And again, you know, I keep hearing that we need to rely on 
leadership to promote responses to these things, but really, in 
these remote situations, it's often the leadership that is 
conducting the harassment and also are the gatekeepers for the 
future careers of these scientists. So we need to ensure that 
these behavioral standards, when they're not being met, are 
able to be enforced by multiple agencies, multiple reporting 
avenues, and not just the keyholders to individual's careers.
    Mr. McNerney. Well, how would an incident of harassment 
harm a researcher's career?
    Dr. Kelly. If that harasser is your boss and you report 
your boss and there are consequences for your boss, that is a 
direct harm, also earning a reputation as a complainer or 
someone who maybe is filing false reports. You know, the 
research shows that 80 percent or more of incidents are not 
reported at all because people fear the retribution and 
consequences.
    Mr. McNerney. And I just want to end by pointing out that I 
think the website idea for reporting seems like a good way to 
move forward and give people access to help if that's needed.
    Dr. Kelly. That sounds good.
    Mr. McNerney. Thank you. And I yield back.
    Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much.
    Mrs. Bice is now recognized.
    Mrs. Bice. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. And I will echo my 
colleague from Oklahoma's words that it's been a pleasure to 
work with you these last two years, and good luck with your 
next adventure.
    Dr. Marrongelle, you mentioned processes with the 
contractors/vendors and that Leidos has said publicly that 
they'll be providing reporting. Are they providing you that 
reporting currently?
    Dr. Marrongelle. Yes, they are.
    Mrs. Bice. And how often are they providing that to you?
    Dr. Marrongelle. Quarterly.
    Mrs. Bice. Perfect. And you mentioned in a previous 
statement that you were looking at adding language to future 
contracts that would maybe address some of these issues when it 
comes to sexual assault cases. Why do you think that wasn't 
added to contracts prior?
    Dr. Marrongelle. It's a great question. I would need to 
consult with my team to follow up on that.
    Mrs. Bice. Why would we not add language I guess is my 
follow up question?
    Dr. Marrongelle. Right.
    Mrs. Bice. It seems like it shouldn't really be a 
conversation. It should be a this is going to be added----
    Dr. Marrongelle. Yes.
    Mrs. Bice [continuing]. To future contracts.
    Dr. Marrongelle. I think yes. So within the contracting 
world, I think we just want to make sure that whatever we're 
putting in there is consistent with what we're legally allowed 
to do or asked to make those changes if we need to make changes 
to law.
    Mrs. Bice. Can you modify an existing contract with an 
addendum to be able to add language in it now currently to 
address these issues?
    Dr. Marrongelle. I believe we can. I can follow up to be 
100 percent on that.
    [The information follows:]

    This contract was originally awarded in 2011 and did not 
include specific language on reporting of sexual harassment or 
assault because prospective contractors are required to have 
internal policies in place to address these issues. After NSF 
issued the Polar Code of Conduct in 2013, the contractor was 
required to provide an annual report on violations. In 2022, 
the contract was again modified to make this a quarterly 
reporting requirement and to address reporting and resolution 
of those reports. NSF may issue additional contract 
modifications, as necessary, to add contractual language to 
address these specific issues.

    Mrs. Bice. Sure. And finally, should you have a vendor, 
whether it's Leidos or any other contractor that you're working 
with at NSF that is not meeting the expectations, not providing 
the information, not addressing the issue, are you and your 
team willing to cancel those contracts to protect the employees 
that you have at NSF?
    Dr. Marrongelle. Yes, we are.
    Mrs. Bice. Excellent. Thank you. I yield back the balance 
of my time.
    Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much.
    Dr. Foster?
    Mr. Foster. Yes. Dr. Marrongelle, do you have the leverage 
that you need for all the different agencies and particularly 
internationally on this? I noted that not long after the SAHPR 
report came out, the Australian Government issued an analogous 
one that came to, you know, sort of equivalent conclusions, but 
it's my recollection as--during my time on a very multinational 
experiment, there were well-known differences in the cultural 
behavior and standards in different areas. So, first off, do 
you have the leverage? And then if any of the other witnesses 
would like to comment on the sort of international issues that 
may be here.
    Dr. Marrongelle. Yes, thank you for this great question. 
Our leadership of the Office of Polar Programs--currently sit 
on the international committee that oversees all of the 
scientific endeavors in Antarctica. We have been working 
closely with them, and that group is looking to, with our 
leadership, form a specific task force to exactly tackle these 
issues because Australia, like us, has looked into this 
proactively. We've uncovered behavior that we need to address, 
and we need to do this collectively. We also need to learn from 
each other, so I feel confident that we have the leverage that 
we need and the representation that we need and the leadership 
that we need in this international space.
    Mr. Foster. All right. Yes, Dr. Olinto, did you have any?
    Dr. Olinto. Yes, I think you point out a very important 
challenge for all of the scientific community. We have many, 
many international efforts. I myself lead a group with 16 
countries, and the cultures are definitely different. And--but 
I think the majority of our international partners are very 
aware. It's been a wonderful progress and there's still a lot 
to do, but in terms of codes of conduct in meetings and many 
other spaces that bring the international community together, 
but we have had to implement across nations, taking somebody 
off the ice that wasn't part of our team, for example, which 
was from a different nation. So I think we have to be able to 
do these things in these situations. Otherwise, we won't make 
progress.
    Mr. Foster. And so the enforcement there is basically by 
consensus that the experimental group just says, I'm sorry, 
we're not going to deal with that country----
    Dr. Olinto. Yes, we have right now separate codes of 
conduct for different experiments. We are trying to unify them 
within the University of Chicago, and I think most institutions 
probably want to be--we have our own rules within campus. But 
the question is, we send our people everywhere in the world, 
and how do we implement our own standards elsewhere? And we 
expect our people to behave the same way. We can't enforce 
international partners necessarily. But the community of 
science, for example, if we take CERN that I'm sure you know 
very well, has an ombuds professional team that addresses 
exactly these issues. So we are learning from those kinds of 
large efforts, how to make sure all cultures get the message 
that these things are not acceptable, period.
    Mr. Foster. Yes. Dr. Kelly, did you run into any--in your 
discussions here, which I take were international, did you run 
into, you know, real differences in opinion on what might or 
might not constitute acceptable behavior? Whoops, are we--am I 
audible here or----
    Dr. Kelly. Sorry, my audio--was the question addressed to 
me? Could you repeat that?
    Mr. Foster. The question was whether you ran into 
international sort of differences of opinion of what the 
standards ought to be on this?
    Dr. Kelly. Yes, absolutely. When I was actually working in 
the Arctic program, I encountered this. You know, I think it's 
really important to bring together teams at the beginning of 
campaigns and, you know, have the home institution or the host 
institution do some education to the entire team around 
behavioral expectations and norms and also to have the host 
institution, have folks read those and agree to those before 
arrival, but also continue that conversation while folks are 
onsite. That's really important. And, you know, as part of 
that, too, that the behavioral standards are shared across 
these teams and that folks are held to them, you know, to the 
highest standards, and that reporting is conducted to all of 
the home institutions and relevant--you know, all relevant 
institutions so not one institution is tasked with taking 
responsibility but that they all are. And we see that as the 
best way to make sure that folks are held accountable in these 
kinds of murkier and diverse situations.
    Mr. Foster. Thank you. And I will use my last seven seconds 
to echo my colleagues' gratitude for--to our Chair for her 
years of service and what she has accomplished, which is truly 
historic.
    Thank you. I yield back.
    Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much.
    We're going to try to complete our hearing before we break 
for the vote so we won't have to return.
    Mr. Feenstra, you're recognized.
    Mr. Feenstra. Thank you, Chairman Johnson, and Ranking 
Member Lucas, and thank you, Chairwoman Johnson, for all your--
all that you've done for this Committee, and I wish you the 
best in your future endeavors. I also want to thank the 
witnesses and your testimony for sharing the knowledge on this 
urgent subject.
    Dr. Olinto, one of the key characteristics of the U.S. 
Antarctic Program is the cooperation between the NSF and the 
university stakeholders like the University of Chicago. From 
your perspective, is there any additional guidance or any other 
educational opportunities that could be helpful as we move 
forward based on the findings that came from this report?
    Dr. Olinto. Yes, there's a lot to do from all sides. I 
think we can improve our communications and our training. We 
need to make sure everybody on ice is aware that this is an 
issue that has to be finished, that we don't want to ever have 
these situations again, and for that, every single person needs 
some responsibility. These are small teams and in very 
difficult, challenging places without boundaries between 
professional and social life, so we need to make sure every 
member has that not notion of the expectations. And I think we 
need to have communications between our own deans of students 
and Title IX within each institution and NSF and Leidos. And 
you know, it's a complicated set of folks that are supposed to 
be paying attention to these issues. And we've been discussing 
how we will try to do our best to make sure every institution 
involved that represents each of those individuals is able to 
talk to each other and make sure we follow up.
    Mr. Feenstra. Well, thank you for those comments. And you 
hit it on the head that there's got to be follow up. And 
hopefully, there's also data or, you know, information that 
after two years from now that we can look back and say, all 
right, what did we accomplish, and did we go down the right 
pathways?
    Dr. Marrongelle, the NSF obviously has field research 
facilities all over the world, many of them obviously in remote 
environments. The lessons learned, how can we apply these to 
other locations, and does it--can it be a one-size-fits-all?
    Dr. Marrongelle. Yes, this is a great question. In 
instances where we see harassment and an assault, there's a 
power differential, and certainly remote locations lead to the 
isolation that then creates the environment for such power 
differentials to result in harassment and assault.
    As we look at what's happening in Antarctica and our 
response to that very isolated and very remote location, we 
have our eye on taking back the lessons learned, what's 
working, and how we can apply those to other field stations, 
whether it be research ships, whether it be other remote field 
sites and on land, and even in our facilities that are in more 
remote locations with access to things like vehicles but still 
somewhat remote throughout the world. So there will be elements 
that we will be able to translate across, but there will need 
to be elements that are unique to each situation.
    Mr. Feenstra. Yes, I firmly agree with that.
    And, Ms. Naeher, I guess my final question is, when you 
look at Leidos, how do we ensure, all right, when something--
when we have a bad outcome, right, when we have an assailant 
and we have transportation issues, right? We're going to have 
transportation issues. How do we protect the victim when we 
have a bad outcome? You know, in some circumstances, we 
probably have--don't have a plane or whatever it might be 
coming for days or weeks, so how do we move forward when we 
have problems like this?
    Ms. Naeher. So thank you for the question. And yes, the 
unique environment certainly makes this extremely challenging. 
There is a U.S. Marshal onsite, so for cases of assaults, we 
turn that over to NSF who manages that. We are happy to look 
into other possible things that can be done to include, you 
know, refinement, confinement spaces, things like that in order 
to keep everybody safe if needed. And we would certainly be 
open to discussion with NSF if they wanted to partner to do 
something like that. I look at it a little bit of like a 
medivac. I mean, we can do things to get planes in if needed in 
emergency situations, and we would work with NSF to determine 
when that threshold was met.
    Mr. Feenstra. Thank you. Thanks, everyone, for their 
testimony. Very good. Thank you.
    Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much.
    Mr. Obernolte.
    Mr. Obernolte. Well, thank you. Thank you very much, Madam 
Chair.
    Dr. Marrongelle, had a question kind of continuing the line 
of questioning from Mr. Feenstra and earlier Mr. Lucas. In 
reading over the needs assessment report and the implementation 
plan, I was struck by the fact that, you know, these findings 
really could be applied to any workplace setting. It's apparent 
that our problems with the USAP are particularly acute. But the 
way that we've addressed solving those problems doesn't seem to 
me to be tailored at all to the unique workplace setting of 
USAP. And I was surprised by that. I kind of thought it was a 
missed opportunity. There's only a single paragraph in the 
report that is dedicated to setting out, you know, these unique 
set of circumstances, the fact that it's remote workplace 
settings where sometimes the boundaries between personal life 
and professional life can be blurred. Now, it's only one 
paragraph in the report, and the only thing that's site-
specific in the implementation plan are things like peepholes 
and key distribution.
    So I wonder if you could take a couple of minutes and talk 
about the unique workplace setting in Antarctica, how that 
contributes to sexual harassment and sexual assault, and the 
things that we could uniquely do to solve those problems in the 
USAP because, otherwise, I think there's a missed opportunity. 
We're really not talking about that in the implementation plan.
    Dr. Marrongelle. Thank you. Yes, this is a great question. 
I think as I alluded to in my previous response, the isolation 
really contributes to the prevalence of, or the increased 
prevalence of, harassment. When you have an advisor and 
doctoral students who are out in the field somewhere, you have 
now taken away the support system from the doctoral students 
should they be experiencing harassment from their advisor.
    What is unique about Antarctica is figuring out ways to 
keep those individuals connected to their support systems or 
even if it is in one of the stations when you are, as my 
colleagues have said, when you are living and breathing every 
day with your colleagues, you don't get to go home to get away 
from them--from the office--because you are all in the same 
situation, in the same environment.
    A couple of things that we're looking at is certainly our 
physical infrastructure. We have prioritized building of a new 
lodging facility at McMurdo this year which will provide single 
rooms, so that will help with some of the safety of 
individuals--that will help us be able to accommodate some of 
that. And then there is communication. We've mentioned the 
additional satellite phones that are going out to the field 
stations. We're not satisfied with that. We want to keep 
pressing on that. How do we ensure, again, going back to the 
support structure, that individuals are not isolated from their 
support structure?
    The satellite phones are one step. What we're going to 
continue to press and understand is how do we continue to 
provide access to individuals and services? The on-ice advocate 
really has been impactful, very impactful, just for the short 
time that the advocate's been there. So we'll be looking at do 
we need to provide additional advocates, additional personnel? 
Do we need to provide other types of counselors or 
ombudspersons and at which stations and ensuring that no matter 
where you are on the continent that you would have access?
    So those are some of the things that we've been thinking 
about. We wanted to ensure that we could implement speedily 
this season and get some things off the ground, but we know the 
work's not done.
    Mr. Obernolte. I'm glad to hear that. I wish that those 
subjects had been explored a little bit more thoroughly in the 
implementation plan because, frankly, to me, it seemed like it 
could have been copied and pasted from any other workplace 
sexual assault prevention plan anywhere. And with the things 
that you just said I think are the things that are really going 
to get to the crux of what's causing this situation.
    And if I could be so bold as to make an unsolicited 
suggestion, maybe look at the education part as well because 
the things that you just said about the way that that isolated 
setting contributes to those feelings of isolation and the way 
that the line gets blurred before between professional and 
personal conduct I think are things that we need to tell people 
who are going into that environment. And I think that if we do 
a good job at preparing people, that maybe when they get into 
those situations, they'll say, oh, right, that's right, I was 
warned about that. This is exactly what I'm going through. And 
I think that that was missing in the implementation plan.
    But I want to thank you very much for your testimony, and 
thank you for our shared commitment to reduce this problem that 
certainly should no longer be a stain on our research programs 
in Antarctica. I yield back, Madam Chair.
    Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much. That is our last 
questioner. And before we bring the hearing to a close, I want 
to thank our witnesses for testifying before the Committee 
today. The record will remain open for two weeks for additional 
statements from the Members or any additional questions to the 
Committee or witnesses.
    Our witnesses are now excused, and the hearing is 
adjourned.
    [Whereupon, at 2:28 p.m., the Committee was adjourned.]

                                Appendix

                              ----------                              


                   Answers to Post-Hearing Questions



                   Answers to Post-Hearing Questions
Responses by Dr. Karen Marrongelle
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
 
Responses by Ms. Kathleen Naeher
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
 


Responses by Dr. Angela V. Olinto
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]