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Kelvin Simmons is the new director of the Missouri Department of Economic Development, replacing Joe Driskell who held the position for 10 years. Simmons had been serving as chairman of the state's Public Service Commission.

Leroy Williams has been named as the new technology secretary for the state of Colorado. Williams, previously the state's chief information officer, will manage the Governor's Office of Innovation and Technology.

The Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation awarded on Monday $25 million in grants to eight U.S. universities that pledged to make entrepreneurship education available across campus. The selected universities, shown with their award amounts, are:

A collaborative agreement formed Tuesday between AT&T and the Southeastern Universities Research Association (SURA) is expected to speed the creation of regional and national grid services. SURA, a nonprofit organization, is comprised of more than 60 leading research institutions in the southern U.S. and the District of Columbia.

New grants totaling more than $28.5 million will help foster the development of new products and markets for agriculturally based products, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced last week. In all, 184 value-added agricultural product market development grants were distributed across 40 states.

A new energy initiative in West Virginia, Energy Village, aims to help grow the state's small and start-up energy and environmental technology businesses. Gov. Bob Wise announced $125,000 in funding for the initiative on Monday.

To promote biotech in Baton Rouge, a new study sponsored by Capital Region Competitive Strategy (CapStrategy) recommends constructing an "idea pipeline" to better commercialize the intellectual property and research generated in the region's universities, hospitals and research institutes. CapStrategy, a nonprofit, cluster-based economic development initiative, operates under the Chamber of Greater Baton Rouge and represents nine parishes in the region.

A new report prepared for the U.S. Economic Development Administration aims to provide public officials, development practitioners and researchers with a greater understanding of the relationship between the creation and commercialization of technologies and regional economic development. Technology Transfer and Commercialization: Their Role in Economic Development begins by outlining the causes and effects of the restructuring of the U.S. economy that necessitates technology-focused development strategies.

The SSTI Weekly Digest will resume publication on January 9. We hope all our readers have a safe, prosperous, and happy 2004.

Building on the his first economic plan, Vermont Governor James Douglas has announced a second set of proposals to retain and create jobs in the state. The governor's eight-page Creating Jobs for the 21st Century embodies several tech-based economic development elements within the four primary goals outlined below. Some of the highlights include:

The high tech economy of Massachusetts is emerging from the recent recession with its fundamental strengths in science, technology and entrepreneurship in good shape, according to the Executive Index of the Massachusetts Innovation Economy. Significant innovation in the state’s industries, however, is necessary to make up for the jobs lost since 2000, the index states.

The promise of high-wage jobs, increased business competitiveness and wealth creation makes the commercialization of university research a central element in the technology-based economic development strategies of many states, provinces and regions of North America.

A recent survey of 343,336 of the nation's fourth and eighth graders indicates more students are performing better in mathematics, according to the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). In the math portion of NCES' National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), large gains were shown among the lowest 10 percent of fourth grade students and most of the lower-scoring eighth grade students since the study was last conducted in 2000.

Nothing in the performance of the residential broadband market suggests that federal subsidies or other government intervention will enhance the market from the perspective of economic efficiency, concludes the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) in a new report, Does the Residential Broadband Market Need Fixing? CBO prepared the report for the Senate Budget Committee, reviewing recent trends in the market for residential fast Internet access to determine whether there are impediments to the market's growth.

Alaska Technology Councils To Merge

The National Association of State Universities and Land Grant Colleges elected University of Georgia president Michael Adams as chairman of its council of presidents.

The National Association of State Universities and Land Grant Colleges elected University of Georgia president Michael Adams as chairman of its council of presidents.

Lizabeth Ardisana was elected Chairperson of the Michigan Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, becoming the first woman to hold the position in the state.

Sonya Buckner has resigned her position as director of the small business incubator for the Montgomery Area Chamber of Commerce to become vice president of special projects for the Oklahoma Chamber of Commerce. Douglas Jones will assume leadership of the Montgomery Incubator.

The Chicago based Committee of 200, an organization of leading women in business, has named Diane Graham as its new chair.

Gross State Products in the nation, after adjustment for inflation, grew at an average annual rate of 3.9 percent from 1992 to 1998, according to a paper released this week by the Bureau of Economic Analysis of the U.S. Department of Commerce. The Gross State Product measures value added in production.

Registrations for SSTI’s fourth annual conference, Beyond the Hype: Tools for Building Tech-based Economies, have been brisk. As a result, the Regal Knickerbocker Hotel has no more vacancies at our special conference discount rate -- if any rooms are available at all by the time of this release. The hotel was kind enough to extend our room block by 50 percent before the discount deadline this past weekend.

During its six years in operation, the Advanced Technological Education (ATE) Program has awarded more than $150 million in grants to strengthen the education of technicians for the high tech fields driving our economy. The ATE Program is managed jointly by the National Science Foundation’s (NSF) Division of Undergraduate Education and the Division of Elementary, Secondary, and Informal Education.

NASA has released a listing of its 1999 Phase II awards for the Small Business Innovation Research Program (SBIR). One hundred ten awards were made to 97 firms in 27 states. The big winner was California with 28 firms garnering 31 awards. For more information regarding these and other NASA SBIR awards, visit http://sbir.gsfc.nasa.gov/

NASA and the Department of Health & Human Services (DHHS) have announced 49 and 15 inventions, respectively, that are available for licensing. Invention titles and, for DHHS, abstracts for each are posted at: http://www.ssti.org/Digest/Tables/090800t2.htm