Evaluation of NSF’s Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program. NSF requested that SRI study the range and types of research experiences available to undergraduates, why individuals (faculty and students) choose to participate in these experiences, and the effects that the experiences have on students’ academic and career decisions. The number of such programs has grown fourfold in the past decade, and they embody a variety of objectives based on providing undergraduate students with research opportunities that enhance their understanding of science and the research process. A major objective is to encourage more minorities and other young people to choose career paths in science and technology. However, although some students inevitably decide that research is not for them, this is not necessarily considered a negative outcome as these students generally come away with a greater understanding of S&T and often acquire skills useful in life and other careers.
Fulbright Visiting Scholar Program. SRI is in the process of conducting an outcome assessment of the Visiting Fulbright Scholars Program. The program provides support for foreign scholars and professionals to come to the United States to conduct research or teach in U.S. institutions. The assessment has entailed developing a sample of grantees from 1980 to 2000 in 16 countries, conducting interviews and focus groups with former grantees from most of those countries, and designing and conducting a survey of grantee. The survey is just about to be closed out, after which SRI will analyze survey findings and prepare a final report and executive summary.
Global Assessment of Technology Infrastructure. SRI has applied computer modeling of scientific literature databases to S&T policy assessments of the development of indicators related to S&T/economic development linkages; analysis of research activity in developing countries; NSF cooperative science programs in Italy and India; the identification of strong research activity in German science; the identification of European centers of materials research activity; the examination of scientific mobility in biotechnology, especially between universities and industry; and the generation of profiles describing private and governmental organizations' research.
IFC Life Sciences Opportunities and Challenges Assessment. SRI assisted the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the private investment arm of the World Bank, in creating its Life Sciences Investment Program. The team first identified the particular life sciences/biotech market segments in which member countries have a comparative advantage. SRI then provided the IFC with investment guidelines, recommending business models and methods of financing most appropriate for this sector. In a follow-on project based on SRI’s recommended joint-venture model, the team surveyed North American, European and Japanese life science companies to identify potential partners for the IFC and to arrange meetings.
Life Sciences Matchmaking Services: SRI assisted the International Finance Corporation (IFC) in identifying and approaching the most promising investment opportunities in the life sciences/biotech industry in its member countries. The strategy recommended which business models and methods of financing are most appropriate for this sector, and how the IFC could minimize risk while understanding the attractiveness of segments and countries.
Obtaining Industry Views on Experiences in Collaboration with Federal Laboratories under CRADAs. The U.S. Department of Commerce, through the National Science Foundation, contracted with SRI to conduct a study to update the Department’s current state of knowledge about the experience of private sector firms that have entered into Cooperative Research and Development Agreements (CRADAs) with one or more federal laboratories. This was accomplished through conversations with a number of targeted companies that have entered into CRADAs with Federal laboratories. Subsequently, SRI integrated the results of the interviews into a presentation to the Industrial Research Institute’s External Research Director’s Network Meeting in Washington.
Progress of the Engineering Education Coalitions Program: The Engineering Education Coalitions program began in 1989 and NSF ultimately funded six coalitions of universities involving nearly fifty schools distributed across the country. The objective of the program is to stimulate systemic reform of undergraduate engineering education across a broad range of institutions. Each coalition has a somewhat different focus in developing new curricular materials, laboratory settings for undergraduates, and other pedagogical approaches, and represents a collection of diverse institutional settings in which these developments take place and are tested. NSF contracted with SRI International to conduct a study assessing the progress of the Program as a whole, across a broad range of issues.
Qualitative Evaluation Study of NSF’s Centers for Learning & Teaching. The Centers for Learning and Teaching program is a new NSF effort to train leaders in mathematics and science education and to engender improvements in the professional development of in-service math and science teachers. The program makes $10 million grants available to “centers”—i.e., partnerships of universities and school districts—that have organized around the conduct of research in science and math education and in implementing improvements in the training and professional development of teachers. SRI conducted an evaluation of the centers’ performance, a task that has entailed multiple visits to each of 10 funded centers over a 3-year period.
Study of the Outcome & Impacts of the NSF Minority Postdoctoral Research Fellowships (MPRF) Program. NSF’s MPRF program provides opportunities to recent minority doctorate recipients in biological, social, behavioral, and economic sciences to obtain additional training, gain research experience under the sponsorship of established scientists, direct their research efforts across traditional disciplinary lines, and avail themselves of unique research resources, sites, and facilities. This study has two major components pertaining to higher education in S&E: (1) a survey of all fellowship recipients since the program’s inception in the late 1980s, and (2) analysis of national data on enrollments and degrees from NSF and National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) surveys for the purpose of determining the potential pool of minority applicants to this program. There is also a bibliometric component in this study.
The Role of NSF’s Support of Engineering in Enabling Technological Innovation. In 1995, the National Science Foundation contracted with SRI International to conduct a major 4-year study of how NSF support for engineering research has contributed to the development and commercialization of twelve significant recent innovations, which were selected at the inception of the project by an advisory panel. The six innovations studied were the Internet, magnetic resonance imaging (MNR); high performance polymer matrix composites, computer-aided design applied to electronic circuits; optical fiber for telecommunications; and, the cellular phone.
U.S. Fulbright Student Program. SRI has been conducting an outcome assessment of the U.S. Fulbright Student Program. The evaluation designed by SRI will survey program alumni who participated in the program between 1980 and 2000, and were hosted by foreign institutions representing all geographic regions of the world.
Workshop on International Aspects of Graduate Science and Engineering Education and International Mobility of Scientists and Engineers: This project was intended to provide NSF’s Science Resources Studies Division with up-to-date analyses concerning recent changes in graduate science and engineering education and the international mobility of scientists and engineers. The analysis focused on three regions: Europe, Asia, and Latin America. SRI engaged experts in each of the regions to develop papers that served as the basis for a workshop. The information generated by this effort assisted NSF in its continuing efforts to promote the human S&E infrastructure in a changing global environment.
R&D Divisions