One of the recurring issues in many states for financing centers as part of their tech-based economic development portfolio is whether or not the organizations resulting from the multi-year, multimillion grants should become financially self sufficient at the end of the grant term.
As state and local governments make tough funding choices with tight budgets, a new Economic Policy Institute (EPI) report shows adequate and effective funding of education is the best way to achieve faster growth, more jobs, greater productivity, and more widely shared prosperity.
The U.S. Department of Commerce and the National Academy of Public Administration (NAPA) recently released reports making recommendations to address the challenges faced by the manufacturing industry. One of the recommendations in the NAPA report suggests creating a strategic plan that articulates the "next generation" of the Commerce Department's National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP).
Wanted: all managers in private-sector research and development (R&D) facilities. The Southern Growth Policies Board is conducting a nationwide survey to gain insight into drivers and policies of industrial R&D. The survey attempts to illuminate university-company relationships.
Women made significant progress in the sciences over the last two decades, but gains have stalled — and in some cases eroded — in engineering and computer sciences, according to a report released Tuesday by the National Council for Research on Women (NCRW). The downturn comes despite effective new programs to increase women's participation in these fields.
With federal support for the National Institues of Health increasing substantially each year -- to the point now that NIH supports more than 50 percent of the federal basic research budget -- and some states directing millions of dollars each year into health and biotechnology research, one might stop to ask: is it worth it?
Pennsylvania Governor Tom Ridge will deliver the keynote address at Creating Opportunity: Tools for Building Tech-Based Economies, SSTI’s Fifth Annual Conference, which will be held September 19-21, 2001 at the Omni William Penn in Pittsburgh.
Albany, New York
The National Science Foundation has released Federal Funds for Research and Development: Fiscal Years 1999, 2000, and 2001, Vol. 49, presenting 111 detailed statistical tables.
George Atkinson is taking a year-long leave of absence from his position as a professor in chemistry and optical sciences at the University of Arizona to serve as the first American Institute of Physics science fellow at the U.S. State Department.
George Atkinson is taking a year-long leave of absence from his position as a professor in chemistry and optical sciences at the University of Arizona to serve as the first American Institute of Physics science fellow at the U.S. State Department. 
Margie Emmermann has been named Director of the Arizona Department of Commerce. For the past seven years, Ms. Emmermann has been the state's policy adviser to Mexico and liaison to the Hispanic Community. 
The National Science Foundation has named Judith A. Ramaley as the Foundation's new Assistant Director for Education and Human Resources (EHR). A biologist, Dr. Ramaley served most recently as president of the University of Vermont.
New Technology Week reports William Schneider, president of International Planning Services, has been picked to chair the Defense Science Board. 
Dennis J. Sysko is serving as interim president of the Anne Arundel County High Technology Council, following the resignation of president John G. Rice. Mr. Sysko, who is currently serving as the group's treasurer, will perform both roles until a replacement president is elected in January.
The Office of Technology Transfer in the National Institutes of Health has published abstracts of eight government-owned patents that are available for licensing. To help bring these commercialization opportunities to the attention of a wider audience, SSTI has reprinted the abstracts on the following webpage: http://www.ssti.org/Digest/Tables/072001t2.htm
At the end of June, Governor Bob Holden signed an executive order committing $21.5 million of the state’s tobacco settlement funds for biotech research during fiscal year 2002. Governor Holden made his announcement prior to signing Senate Bill 500, which expands the state’s job training program to prepare Missouri’s work force for new careers in life sciences.
While cities such as Boston and San Francisco, not surprisingly, are home to many high-growth companies, a recent report from the National Commission on Entrepreneurship (NCOE) reveals large concentrations of high-growth companies in less familiar areas such as Elkhart, IN, and Provo, UT.
The William and Phyllis Mack Center for Technological Innovation was founded last month at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. The center is the product of a $10 million gift from William L. Mack, the president and senior managing partner of the Mack Organization — a national owner, investor and developer of warehouse facilities.
Aggregated venture capital investments are commonly used by state and local policymakers to assess the “health” of their tech-based economies. As a result, some of the most accessed pages of the SSTI Weekly Digest web archives have been the state-by-state tables SSTI generates with the release of each quarter’s Moneytree™ venture capital survey results.
Math and science students exposed to high expectations, challenging curriculum and sound instructional methods may hold an advantage over their peers, suggests a report funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF).
Public and private efforts to attract more women into high-tech fields of information technology have a significant hurdle to overcome: 60 percent of women already in IT jobs wouldn’t choose the same career path if starting over, according to Women In Technology, a recent survey by DeLoitte & Touche.
Camden, Arkansas
The June 19, 2001 issue of The Bond Buyer reported that Camden, with a population just over 13,000, approved a one-cent sales tax to raise $6 million over four years to support downtown business revitalization efforts. Plans include construction of a business incubator and development of a 500-acre business park.
Missouri
Growth in personal income tax has led to a revival of state tax revenues, the same source that led to the previous decline, according to a report released by the Nelson A. Rockefeller Institute of Government. The report indicates sustained growth in states' economies over the past three quarters, with increases in revenue from personal, sales and corporate taxes, creating optimism for the future of state budgets.
The city of Montpelier, Vt., will soon join the ranks of other high-tech cities as it prepares to implement its first Wi-Fi “hotzone” in the central downtown area. With support from Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vt), city officials and local businesses, the Vermont Broadband Council recently launched MontpelierNet, a high-speed Internet network that will bring wireless broadband Internet access to the city.