I have been active in the American Meteorological Society (AMS)

since the 1980's and have always enjoyed associating with those researchers who truly represent the title of meteorologist (from here on noted as a "met" for short). Typically, "on-air" broadcasting mets are not doing "hard core" research. What I mean by this is that most all broadcasting mets are not publishing research articles about meteorology. Certainly publishing is the work done primarily by the scholarly side of meteorology but there are many mets that do some hard core research and present this information. That's why it is fun to go to local and national meteorology conferences and meet the people, read the research journals & papers and see the ppt presentations given by "real mets" in the industry. Additionally, and on a local level, the mets in the trenches of daily meteorology work are the ones that work for the local branch of the National Weather Service (NWS) which is under the umbrella organization of the NOAA. See this link for more:

Over the years, I have met a lot NWS mets while working as a broadcast met in 8 different states from both the east coast to the west coast. They are the backbone of all the main forecasts that get put on air and are the real unsung heros of meteorology. Many are part of the AMS and it is always fun when a local chapter of the AMS gets together to discuss weather. Typically there are many from other related organizations - education, flood control districts, water districts, etc. - who come to these meetings and they can be quite an eclectic group of weather geeks (I am including myself in this group).