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The third installment to Walkin' the Tech Talkin' Gov Walk (see the April 17 and May 8 issues of the Digest) covers the outcomes of the 2006 legislative sessions for two states, Illinois and Wisconsin.

With assets totalling more than $15 billion, the Indiana Public Employees Retirement Fund (PERF) has decided to place $100 million into higher-risk equity placements through its first Indiana Investment Fund. The fund will exclusively target venture capital deals within Indiana, according to the PERF news release. Like pension funds in many states, PERF has a requirement to place a certain percentage of its assets in private equity. The PERF goal is 5 percent and includes real estate deals as well.

The opportunity for innovation and the need for angel capital are not limited to the major metropolitan areas and large research universities, as the board of trustees for Taylor University and leaders of the Grant County Economic Growth Council in rural Indiana will attest. The east-central Indiana county is home to just over 70,500 residents and, soon, two angel funds.

Maryland General Assembly approval of a $1 million boost for the Maryland Industrial Partnerships (MIPS) Program, one of the nation's oldest continually run programs to support university-industry research projects leading to technology commercialization, marks a 74 percent increase above the $1.35 million program budget for 2006. The increase was proposed by Gov.

While the Phoenix Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA) has the recipe for a creative economy - people in creative occupations, industries with a creative workforce, and an environment that supports creativity - it falls short of the national average in more than 75 percent of all creative occupational categories, a new study by the Maricopa Partnership for Arts and Culture (MPAC) finds.

If you know any secondary school teachers or, like millions of Americans, you are heavily involved in high school graduation season right now, you know that the Class of `06 is not like the Class of `05 or the upcoming Class of '07. Assemblages of students tend to develop discernable class personalities as they march from kindergarten through grade 12, distinct and possibly very different than most of their individual personalities.

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.

Much of the U.S. policy debate regarding the impact of globalization has focused on workforce preparedness and the need for American industry to sustain innovation. Bills before Congress urge increased spending on R&D, especially in the physical sciences and engineering. Much of the data that has helped fuel the competitiveness discussion has focused on indices and statistical reports presenting the U.S. in comparison to other nations. 

Marketing tech-based economic development (TBED) programs can be challenging, particularly with the diverse nature of its target audiences of entrepreneurs, existing companies, financial sources, university researchers and, oftentimes, legislators. Sometimes, even the name of the program can cause misconceptions, particularly when a new initiative is outside the traditional services or roles offered by the TBED organization. A recent example of this comes from South Carolina.

Summer classes, camps and special programs to stimulate and sustain K-12 students' interests in science and math will be found all across the country during the next few months. A less frequently occurring phenomenon will be taking place in the Great Lakes Region of Iowa, helping a select group of college students to combine entrepreneurship, rural economic development, and recreation.

The U.S. automotive industry is one of the nation's oldest modern manufacturing sectors, and, similar to many other older populations, is increasingly making its home in the South. Despite this fact, the sector remains heavily centered in the Midwest, according to a new article from the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. The Geographic Evolution of the U.S. Auto Industry reveals 47 percent of the nation's motor vehicle employment still resides in three states: Michigan, Indiana and Ohio.

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has published its online statistical resource center for state-level statistics on various science and engineering (S&E) indicators. Drawing data from the most recent updates to seven annual NSF surveys and U.S. Census statistics, the profiles includes downloadable Excel or PDF versions of state statistics for:

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.