The Chronical of Higher Education
Paul Basken
March 24, 2016
It’s long been a rite of passage at major research universities:
To have a chance at tenure, scientists first need to win at least one full-size
federal grant.
Now
that’s changing. Though they’re reluctant to discuss details, several large
research universities admit that they’ve begun granting tenure to faculty
members who haven’t yet crossed that threshold, a concession to several years
of flat federal support for science.
Read more…
News posts of interest to researchers, social scientists, and those following new Harvard Kennedy School research.
Thursday, March 24, 2016
Wednesday, March 23, 2016
Most Nonprofits Operate Without a Plan, Survey Finds
Philanthropy News Digest
March 16, 2016
Even as they face growing competition and a "seismic"
demographic shift, many nonprofits continue to operate as usual, failing to
prepare for inevitable economic downturns, neglecting to cultivate meaningful
relationships with supporters, and not bothering to share information on their
effectiveness and impact, a report from the Concord Leadership
Group finds.
Tuesday, March 15, 2016
Handful of Biologists Went Rogue and Published Directly to Internet
The New York Times
Amy Harmon
March 15, 2016
On Feb. 29, Carol Greider of Johns Hopkins University became the third Nobel Prize laureate
biologist in a month to do something long considered taboo among biomedical
researchers: She posted a report of her recent
discoveries to a publicly accessible website,
bioRxiv, before submitting it to a scholarly journal to review for “official’’
publication.
It was a small act of information age
defiance, and perhaps also a bit of a throwback, somewhat analogous to Stephen
King’s 2000 self-publishing an e-book or Radiohead’s 2007 release of a
download-only record without a label. To commemorate it, she tweeted the
website’s confirmation under the hashtag #ASAPbio, a newly coined rallying cry
of a cadre of biologists who say they want to speed science by making a key
change in the way it is published.
Thursday, March 3, 2016
Research Scrutiny: Corporate influence and outright fraud undermine academic science
The Chronicle of Higher Education
Tom Bartlett
February 29, 2016
Corporate influence over science tends to be subtle. Just as
politicians who solicit donations from Wall Street banks deny allegiance to
their backers, scientists insist that the money they accept from industry does
not alter their scholarly conclusions. Surely no university researcher would
ever admit being in cahoots with a company.
Not usually, anyway. In November, the Associated Press obtained emails
sent by James O. Hill, a professor of pediatrics and medicine at the University
of Colorado at Denver and director of the university’s Center for Human
Nutrition, to executives at the Coca-Cola Company.
Publication Impact of NIH-funded Research – A First Look
National Institutes of Health
Office of Extramural Research
Mike Lauer
March 2, 2016
In a recent PNAS commentary,
Daniel Shapiro and Kent Vrana of Pennsylvania State University, argue that
“Celebrating R and D expenditures badly misses the point.” Instead of focusing
on how much money is spent, the research enterprise should instead focus on its
outcomes – its discoveries that advance knowledge and lead to improvements in
health.
Of
course, as we’ve
noted before, measuring research impact is hard, and there is no gold standard.
But for now, let’s take a look at one measure of productivity, namely the
publication of highly-cited papers. Some in the research community suggest that
a research paper citation is a nod to the impact and significance of the
findings reported in that paper – in other words, more highly-cited papers are
indicative of highly regarded and impactful research.
Tuesday, March 1, 2016
Public-Affairs Dean Wants Research to Reach Policy Makers Faster
The Chronicle of Higher Education
Sarah Brown
February 28, 2016
Angela Evans was drawn to the deanship at the University
of Texas at Austin’s Lyndon B. Johnson
School of Public Affairs for many
reasons, namely the school’s national reputation and its history of
informing
critical policy debates. But it was the collaborative spirit Ms. Evans sensed
throughout the
school that sealed the deal, she says.
"I wanted to work in an environment where the
students didn’t know everything," says Ms. Evans,
who has been a clinical
professor of public-policy practice at the school for more than six years and
started as dean on January 16. "Consistently, I saw a group of students
who were diverse and eager
to exchange ideas, and collaboration was really
something they excelled in."
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)