The CICEP Economic Impact Working Group met by telephone conference on March 5 to discuss project progress and plans. 

Carol Robbins and Zoe Ambargis from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA), and Dave Swenson of Iowa State University, are continuing to work on input/output analyses of data provided by institutions who have volunteered to participate in our economic impact analysis demonstration. Once they have completed an analysis of the core impact data, they will also conduct analyses of R&D data and also student and visitor data.

The group is working toward developing a workshop and a guide around the demonstration analyses. These will be available in the late summer or fall of 2012.

The group meets again by conference call on April 4. If you have questions about the project, contact Jim Woodell (jwoodell@aplu.org, 814-414-3249), APLU Director of Innovation and Technology Policy.

APLU is partnering with the Association of American Universities (AAU) on this effort, in addition to BEA. 

On February 17, the newly reconstituted CICEP Assessment Tools Working Group met by conference call to discuss ideas for disseminating the Assessment Tools, encouraging their use, and helping to inform users of effective practices.

The group talked about some ideas for prmoting the assessment tools, including submitting a proposal for a presentation of the tool at the National Outreach Scholarship Conference, spreading the word among other APLU councils and commissions, and identifying other professional organizations and government organizations that we should reach out to.

The group talked about putting the tools behind a registration wall so that we would be able to keep track of who has downloaded the tools and follow up with them to get feedback.

Other ideas for follow-up and ongoing work on the Assessment Tools discussed by the group included: working with institutions who have used the tools to write up case studies (for sharing on the APLU web site and in other places) about their experiences; creating a polished, desktop-published version of the tools in a single printable publication; investigate how to encourage scholarly work to be done in conjunction with the tools; make connections between these tools and the CICEP Metrics effort; explore creating peer groups or mentoring pairs--institutions that can share their experiences with one another in small communities of practice.

The working group will meet again via conference call on Tuesday 3/20 and talk about advancing these ideas. Contact Jim Woodell (jwoodell@aplu.org, 814-414-3249) at APLU if you are interested in getting involved.

And please let us know what you think by sharing your comments here!

From Indianapolis Business Journal:

Like all universities, Purdue University wants to derive more revenue from the research of its professors. But the West Lafayette school's leaders think the process of matching its professors with people who can help create commercial products is too cumbersome.

So last week Purdue announced a new Innovation and Commercialization Center, which is supposed to be a one-stop shop for professors to get help developing their research into products and for outside investors to find out what research is taking place inside Purdue.

Read more.

From Technology Review:

Young stars dominate the technology headlines. But outside the Internet, research shows, innovators are actually getting older as complexity rises.

Read more.

From USPTO Web Site:

The Department of Commerce's United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is seeking nominations for the 2012 National Medal of Technology and Innovation. The medal is presented each year by the President of the United States and is this country's highest award for technological achievement.

The Medal is awarded annually to individuals, teams (up to four individuals), companies or divisions of companies for their outstanding contributions to America's economic, environmental and social well-being.

Read more.

From Innovation Daily:

With billions of dollars invested in R&D at stake, improving the end-to-end management of technology is of critical importance to global political leaders. At present, more than $60B is spent annually on university and federally supported intramural and extramural research in the U.S.

Yet identifying how to improve technology transfer output and outcomes on a consistent and predicable basis remains an ongoing challenge with little consensus on best practices. Unfortunately, most of the recommendations provided do little to address these underlying problems. To find a way out of the thicket, we need to step back and determine exactly what it is that we're trying to do.

Read more.

From The Daily Record:

The governor wants $250,000 every year from each of five research universities - the Johns Hopkins University; Morgan State University; the University of Maryland, Baltimore; the University of Maryland, Baltimore County and the University of Maryland, College Park. There is also a provision in the bill introduced last week for federal labs to participate.

The new fund will be used to finance expansion and refinement of promising technologies and to underwrite research of emerging technologies.

Read more.

From the Daily Yonder:

How important are "creative" jobs to a state's economy and to rural communities?

About two years ago the Mississippi Arts Commission entered into a unique partnership with the Mississippi Development Authority to find out. Realizing they had an overlapping interest in how arts, culture, and design benefit the state's economy and its people, they ordered a study to examine Mississippi's creative industries.

Read more.

From ASU News: Arizona State University's Venture Catalyst in collaboration with ASU's technology transfer arm, Arizona Technology Enterprises (AzTE), is launching a new program aimed at creating startup activity among postdoctoral researchers and graduate students.

As opposed to standard academic modules and programs, this part-time program applies a very 'pracademic' approach to developing an entrepreneurial mindset and real new venture creation. The program modules are taught by pracademic adjunct faculty from leading external organizations, supplemented by online modules from the ASU Venture Catalyst.

Read more.

APLU distributed to its Council on Governmental Affairs (CGA) a sign-on letter expressing opposition to HR 3699, the Research Works Act. This bill, introduced late last year by Representatives Darrell Issa (R-CA) and Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) would prohibit federal agencies from adopting or continuing any programs providing public access to published results of federally supported research. The immediate effect would be to put a stop to the NIH’s Public Access policy which established the PubMed Central database. A۰P۰L۰U has been a strong supporter of PubMed Central and other well-designed public access policies and is a signatory to the letter.  The letter is addressed to Members of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee where the bill has been referred. The letter is being circulated among a broad community of universities, patient advocacy groups, library organizations and others concerned about the bill. Please contact the government affairs office at your institution if you would like to find out more about the letter or your institution's sign-on status. You may also contact Jim Woodell (jwoodell@aplu.org, 814-414-3249) with questions.