The nonprofit Challenger Learning Center of Alaska Board of Directors recently announced the hiring of Sharon Gherman as its new Executive Director. Gherman was the former K-12 program executive for the Alaska Science and Technology Foundation.
Jacques Koppel, president of Minnesota Technology, Inc. since 1991, announced his resignation on July 28. Under Mr. Koppel's leadership, MTI worked with more than 5,600 manufacturing and technology companies around Minnesota, helping the state's economy realize gains of more than $700 million in the process.
Before ending its 2003 session, the Rhode Island legislature signed off on nearly all of the technology-based economic development (TBED) initiatives at the core of Gov. Donald Carcieri's strategy to help the state rebound from the down economy. First outlined in his Feb. 4 State of the State Address (see the Feb.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced earlier this week the availability of $6 million in USDA Rural Development grant funds to support rural economic and community development efforts.
The unsettled nature of the venture capital industry is well depicted in two differing reports released Tuesday. Both detail venture capital investments for the second quarter of 2003, but offer a conflicting picture of U.S. investing activity.
The City of Spokane and a group of local organizations have penned a strategic plan designed to help the city and the Inland Northwest achieve an Innovation Economy.
Nearly 60 percent of the new jobs in the knowledge-based economy of the early 21st century will require skills that are held by just 20 percent of the present workforce, states a new report released by the National Coalition for Advanced Manufacturing (NACFAM). The Case for Enhancing American Workforce Skills examines a growing skills gap in the nation's manufacturing sector and the problems employers have in finding skilled workers able to deal with technological changes in the workplace.
Until now, the opportunities have been fairly limited for tech-based economic developers to learn from the lessons of fellow practitioners running successful entrepreneurship programs.
Small businesses in the U.S. should consider a wide and complex range of factors before investing in foreign patents, recommends a new report prepared by the U.S. General Accounting Office (GAO).
C. Michael Cassidy, president of the Georgia Research Alliance, has been appointed to the governing board of the Biotechnology Industry Organization.
Joint Venture: Silicon Valley has named Russell Hancock as its new president and CEO.
C. Michael Cassidy, president of the Georgia Research Alliance, has been appointed to the governing board of the Biotechnology Industry Organization.
Joint Venture: Silicon Valley has named Russell Hancock as its new president and CEO.
Dr. Lee Eiden, SBIR Program Coordinator for the U.S. Department of Education for nearly seven years, is shifting positions within the agency to work for the Office of Management/Chief Information Office. Dr. Eiden's contributions toward improving the state-federal partnership for SBIR outreach and technical assistance will be greatly missed by the state and local tech-based economic development community.
The director of the Arkansas Department of Economic Development has announced his retirement. Jim Pickens will remain in the position until his replacement is named, according to local news reports.
Pari Sabety, director of Ohio State University's Technology Policy Group, is leaving to become Director of the Neighborhood Markets Initiative, a new program of the Center for Urban and Metropolitan Policy in the Brookings Institution.
The director of the Nebraska Department of Economic Development, Al Wenstrand, is leaving to become executive director of the Florida's Great Northwest, an economic development agency serving the Florida Panhandle.
The first two installments of SSTI's annual look at how TBED will play in the 2006 legislative priorities of the governors can be found in the Digest archives on our website: http://www.ssti.org/Digest/digest.htm
Delaware
Innovation and national competitiveness increasingly are capturing the attention of Congress as the 2006 legislative agenda takes shape. The latest addition is a bipartisan package of three bills introduced to address 20 recommendations outlined in Rising Above the Gathering Storm: Energizing and Employing America for a Brighter Economic Future, a National Academies of Science report issued last October.
Total funding for research and development is expected to increase by approximately 2.9 percent to $329 billion in 2006, according to the joint Battelle-R&D Magazine annual forecast. The projected increase, from the estimated $320 billion spent in 2005, covers all R&D expenditures across industry, government and academia.
To survive economically in an innovation-based economy, Fresno needs to foster the creativity of its people and attract others into the population, says a recent report from the Fresno Creative Economy Council. While encouraging creativity to spur innovation and economic growth has captured the attention of cities and regions across the continent, how to accomplish that goal is less clear for many.
Southern Growth Policies Board has launched its 2006 online survey at http://www.southern.org/main/surveyintro.shtml to poll Southern citizens on their attitudes towards innovation and technology, and their role in the economic future of the region.
The backdrop for this year's annual meeting of the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) was painted in budget cuts, tax increases and nearly three years of gloomy economic news. Only adding salt to the wounds, the meeting was held in California, a state whose FY 2003 deficit – now carried over into FY 2004 because of partisan squabbling – could swallow the entire budget approved in more than half of the states in attendance.
As states forecast the worst fiscal crisis in half a century may be ending, the nation's mayors, too, see marked economic improvement on the horizon, according to a report released last Thursday by the U.S. Conference of Mayors. However, they remain concerned that the economy is still not generating jobs at a sufficient level for U.S. workers.
The 2004 budget for the U.S. Department of Agriculture, as passed by the House of Representatives mid-July, includes $678 million for the Distance Learning, Telemedicine and Broadband program (DLT). Through loans, grants and loan and grant combinations, DLT provides the facilities and equipment to link rural education and medical facilities with more urban centers and other facilities.
Late last week, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) released a Broad Agency Announcement (BAA) calling for academic white papers that will focus on specific areas related to social science issues. This is the first step in the review process for colleges and universities that would like to be selected as a Homeland Security Center of Excellence (HS-Center). The Department anticipates selecting at least one HS-Center by end of November 2003 and up to nine more HS-Centers by end of 2004.