SSTI Digest

“[I]f this nation is to succeed in the new century, the covenant between our insitutions and the public they serve must be renewed and again made binding.” So begins Renewing the Covenant: Learning, Discovery, and Engagement in a New Age and Different World, the sixth and final report of the Kellogg Commission on the Future of State and Land-Grant Universities. Released last week, the 30-page report outlines several significant challenges facing higher education in the New Economy: 

The South Atlantic region leads the nation in doctoral scientist and engineer employment rates, according to Characteristics of Doctoral Scientists and Engineers in the United States: 1997 (NSF 00-308), prepared by the National Science Foundation (NSF). NSF completed an in-depth demographic and employment study of doctoral scientists and engineers taken from the 1997 Survey of Doctorate Recipients (SDR). It includes a ranking of doctoral scientists’ and engineers’ employment and salary levels by region and by state. 

Of the 10 regions, the study found the South Atlantic region (DE, DC, FL, GA, MD, NC, SC, VA, and WV) employs 18.4 percent of the nation’s 518,440 doctoral scientists and engineers. Following closely behind is the Pacific region (AK, CA, HI, OR, and WA), with employment rates of 18.1 percent. The East South Central region (AL, KY, MS, and TN) employs the fewest, accounting for just 4.3 percent of the total. 

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has several solicitations open currently. Four opportunities of particular interest to the S&T community are highlighted below. These and additional funding opportunities from NSF can be found on a web page that conveniently lists the solicitations by deadline: http://www.nsf.gov/home/deadline/deadline.htm 

The Washington Technology Center has released its first annual Index of Innovation and Technology. The report examines 34 performance indicators in six broad areas: Innovation, Competitiveness, Growth, Financial Capacity, Human Potential, Quality of Life, and Internet Infrastructure. For each indicator, Washington is compared to several other states or to national averages.  Six summary findings or recommendations are made in major areas that government, education, and industry must focus upon to ensure the state's continued economic success. They include: 

Reliably measuring performance in federal programs, particularly programs involving state-federal partnership is difficult, according to the U. S. General Accounting Office (GAO). Managing for Results: Challenges Agencies Face in Producing Credible Performance Information (GAO/GGD-00-52) and the two supporting written testimonies, Challenges in Producing Credible Performance Information (T-GGD/RCED-00-134) and Using GPRA to Help Congressional Decision making and Strengthen Oversight (T-GGD-00-95), identify several of the same issues state technology-based economic development programs have encountered for years as they attempt to define their own success for state legislatures and constituencies. 

article prepared by Kay Etzler, SBIR Specialist for the North Carolina Small Business Technology Development Center

Arizona  The Ways & Means Committee of the Arizona House of Representatives has passed a bill to eliminate $250 million in sales tax exemptions for a number of products and services, including telecommunications equipment and solar devices. If the bill passes, proceeds would be used to raise teachers' salaries. 

President Clinton has nominated Arthur C. Campbell as Assistant Secretary for Economic Development at the U.S. Department of Commerce. Mr. Campbell, of Chattanooga, Tennessee, currently serves as the Deputy Under Secretary for Rural Development at the United States Department of Agriculture.  Lura Powell, former Director of the Advanced Technology Program within the Department of Commerce, has accepted the position as Director of the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Richland, Washington.  Steven Zylstra, chair of the Technology Transfer Committee of the Arizona Governor's Strategic Partnership for Economic Development, has accepted the position of President and Chief Executive Officer of the Pittsburgh Technology Council and the Southwestern Pennsylvania Industrial Resource Center. 

President Clinton has nominated Arthur C. Campbell as Assistant Secretary for Economic Development at the U.S. Department of Commerce. Mr. Campbell, of Chattanooga, Tennessee, currently serves as the Deputy Under Secretary for Rural Development at the United States Department of Agriculture. 

Lura Powell, former Director of the Advanced Technology Program within the Department of Commerce, has accepted the position as Director of the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Richland, Washington. 

Steven Zylstra, chair of the Technology Transfer Committee of the Arizona Governor's Strategic Partnership for Economic Development, has accepted the position of President and Chief Executive Officer of the Pittsburgh Technology Council and the Southwestern Pennsylvania Industrial Resource Center. 

SSTI has learned the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) reauthorization language the Senate Small Business Committee (SBC) will be marking up on Tuesday, March 21 is substantially different than HR 2392, passed by the House last fall. While HR 2392 basically makes housekeeping revisions to the $1.1 billion SBIR program, the SBC version includes several components addressing issues a majority of states identified as problems for their own SBIR outreach and assistance efforts. SSTI understands the proposed Senate language has support from key Committee members from both political parties.

For the past ten months, the Federal Technology Business Investment Committee of the Science and Technology Council of the States (STCS) has been developing recommendations to improve state-federal partnership on SBIR. Most of the recommendations of the STCS committee are addressed favorably in the SBC version of the SBIR Reauthorization bill including: