SSTI Digest

SSTI's 7th Annual Conference, to be held in Seattle on Oct. 21-22, is now less than one month away. If you are planning to join 300 of your colleagues from more than 40 states at Building Tech-based Economies: From Policy to Practice, here are a few tips to save your organization a little money: Registration for the conference before the early discount period ends on Sept. 30. Book your flight early. Airline prices will begin to climb soon as your travel dates draw near. United is offering a discount for the conference. Details on our conference website: http://www.ssti.org/conference03.htm [expired] But we strongly encourage you to register for the conference first to make sure there is still room (we're on track to sell out). Since the room block at the Seattle Marriott Waterfront is full, try getting your hotel room at the Edgewater Hotel <http://www.edgewaterhotel.com/>. It's the closest accommodations to the conference site, it's very nice, and it's right on the water! If you book through Expedia.com, you'll save approximately $30/night. Register for the…

The Association of American Universities (AAU) seeks qualified candidates to fill the position of director of federal relations. Reporting to the AAU president, the position supervises the federal relations activities of the association staff, including AAU's efforts to promote investments in basic research and graduate education in NIH, NSF, NASA, the Departments of Defense, Education, Energy, and Homeland Security, as well as student aid in the Department of Education and humanities investments made by NEH. The director is specifically responsible for AAU’s NIH advocacy, including engaging with Congress and the Executive Branch on the NIH budget and on biomedical research policy issues. He or she will work closely with biomedical research advocacy partners, appropriations subcommittee staff, and university officials to accomplish biomedical research funding and policy objectives. In addition, the position shares responsibility for indirect cost and other research policy issues, including merit review, technology transfer and misconduct in science. Supervising federal relations…

Scott Doron has been promoted to director for the Southern Technology Council, the advisory council on innovation and technology policy issues for the Southern Growth Policies Board. Tony Jeff is the new executive director of the Manufacturing Extension Partnership of Mississippi. Robert McMahan has been named North Carolina's Science Advisor. In addition to advising the Governor on science and technology matters, McMahan will oversee the support staff for the North Carolina Board of Science and Technology. The advisor position will report to the secretary of the Department of Commerce. The Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO) promoted Michael Werner to the new position as chief of policy. Formerly, Werner served as BIO's vice president for bioethics.

Scott Doron has been promoted to director for the Southern Technology Council, the advisory council on innovation and technology policy issues for the Southern Growth Policies Board.

Tony Jeff is the new executive director of the Manufacturing Extension Partnership of Mississippi.

Robert McMahan has been named North Carolina's Science Advisor. In addition to advising the Governor on science and technology matters, McMahan will oversee the support staff for the North Carolina Board of Science and Technology. The advisor position will report to the secretary of the Department of Commerce.

The Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO) promoted Michael Werner to the new position as chief of policy. Formerly, Werner served as BIO's vice president for bioethics.

Gov. Jim Doyle last week unveiled his plan to jumpstart the Wisconsin economy. The plan, "Grow Wisconsin," calls for a series of executive actions, private sector partnerships and legislative steps to create high-wage jobs and achieve other goals. Some of the tech-based economic development items outlined in "Grow Wisconsin" are: A new Manufacturing Competitiveness Program. The governor proposes $10 million to the Department of Commerce – leveraged with other private funding and existing resources from the University of Wisconsin System, the Wisconsin Technical College System, the Milwaukee School of Engineering, and the Manufacturing Extension Partnerships – to provide grants to 50 manufacturers to improve their productivity through training, consulting and application of technology. Gov. Doyle also will convene a Manufacturing Summit later this year. Creation of a $300 million fund to invest in venture capital. Gov. Doyle proposes to leverage a minimum of $300 million over the next decade to invest in seed and early-stage companies. To accomplish this, the governor proposes creating…

Gov. Mitt Romney outlined a legislative package on Monday totaling $125 million designed to create more jobs. Many elements of the package target the science and technology communities. Romney laid out the details of the jobs bill in a series of meetings with key business, labor and academic leaders, and with members of his Regional Competitiveness Councils, which are all-volunteer boards that guide economic development in different areas of the state. The legislation – to be filed once final input is received – is focused on expanding key businesses, training workers and developing more housing and commercial space. The bill's $125 million price tag is spread over three years. An estimated $50 million of it would be funded by instituting a change that conforms the state’s tax refund practices to Internal Revenue Service time limits. The remainder would be paid for through self-funding mechanisms or non-General Fund sources. Highlights of the bill include: Matching funds for federal research and development grants made to colleges, universities and other entities…

Investments in science and technology (S&T) – from higher education to industry research and development (R&D) – are the decisive factors in creating a sustainable economic future, a new study finds. The report compares Nebraska with its regional peers and its position relative to national leaders using the Milken Institute’s Technology and Science Index. Seventy-seven indicators in five categories – R&D inputs, risk capital and entrepreneurial infrastructure, human capital investment, technology and science workforce, and technology concentration and dynamism – are used to measure how well Nebraska will perform in a knowledge-based economy. Individual indicators include a variety of measurements such as the percentage of a state’s population with Ph.D.s, R&D expenditures per capita and venture capital investment. Nebraska’s best performance was in the study's Research and Development Composite Index, where the state had strong positions in industry R&D, academic R&D, life sciences R&D and agriculture R&D, and in the Technology and Science Workforce…

Gaining an understanding of the real and potential economic impact of government investments in research and development (R&D) has suffered for decades from a lack of rigorous but broadly applicable methodologies for the assessment. To advance the field toward a more appropriate degree of uniformity, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) recently released a primer on economic impact analysis of government R&D programs. Methods for Assessing the Economic Impacts of Government R&D, written by NIST Senior Economist Gregory Tassey, touches on all aspects from metrics to methodology to reasons why these studies are imperative. Tassey also presents guidelines for interpreting the qualitative and quantitative results of various approaches. Increasing global competition and increased efforts in the 1990s toward greater efficiency in government has boosted pressure on federal agencies to conduct economic impact assessments, according to the report. These pressures are relatively new and the majority of agencies have not obtained the internal means to select…

An educated workforce is one of the elements required for a knowledge economy, but not all of the critical jobs require a Ph.D. or even a B.A. Few would dispute, though, the importance of successfully completing high school. With a grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Center for Civic Innovation at the Manhattan Institute has prepared a report entitled Public High School Graduation and College Readiness Rates in the United States. The report includes several tables presenting the high school graduation rates by state and race. Overall, 10 states had graduation rates above 80 percent (shown in parentheses): North Dakota (89), Utah (87), Iowa (85), South Dakota (85), West Virginia (84), Nebraska (84), New Jersey (84), Wisconsin (81), Montana (81), and Idaho (81). The center also computed the percentage of students graduating with college-ready transcripts, using three screens to calculate the minimum requirements necessary to enroll in the average four-year college. The results are presented in Appendix Table 9. [Editor's Note: The method employed to…