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NSF Press Release

 


Embargoed until: September 30, 1998
NSF PR 98-60 - September 30, 1998

Media contact:

 K. Lee Herring

 (703) 306-1070

 kherring@nsf.gov

Program contacts:

 Lawrence Goldberg

 (703) 306-1339

 lgoldber@nsf.gov

 

 Paul Jennings

 (703) 306-1696

 pjenning@nsf.gov

This material is available primarily for archival purposes. Telephone numbers or other contact information may be out of date; please see current contact information at media contacts.

NSF Awards Grants for Integrative Innovation in Graduate Education

The National Science Foundation (NSF) today announced the awarding of $40.5 million over five years to 17 doctorate-granting institutions to promote integrative graduate education and research training. These training grants are intended to produce a diverse group of engineers and scientists well-prepared for a broad spectrum of emerging career opportunities in industry, government and academe.

NSF's Integrative Graduate Education and Research Traineeship (IGERT) grants will provide students with an in-depth, multidisciplinary education through coursework and research experience. In addition, career development will be emphasized by the high priority placed on students' communication and teamwork skills, experience with modern instrumentation, responsible conduct of research and international awareness.

"A new pedagogical approach is needed to meet the needs of tomorrow's Ph.D.s," said NSF acting deputy director Joseph Bordogna. "As well as being astute in a discipline, they must also be prepared to address intellectual issues that transcend disciplinary boundaries, since much new knowledge is increasingly created at the interfaces of traditional disciplines. The IGERT investment is an attempt to develop educational models toward this end, with a direct focus on the integration of education and research," he said.

The resulting programs will also offer experiences relevant to both academic and non-academic careers by linking graduate research with research in industry, national laboratories, and other non- academic settings.

NSF's Assistant Director of Education and Human Resources, Luther Williams, described the agency-wide program as being consistent with NSF's overall education agenda to encourage change at all levels of science, mathematics, engineering, and technology education. "IGERT is the first NSF program to demonstrate concretely NSF's strategic goal to integrate education and research at the graduate level, consistent with the National Science Board's commitment," Williams noted of the Board's recent recommendation on graduate education. "Further, through collaborations between academe and industry, graduates will be well-positioned to take the lead in facing multidisciplinary challenges of the future," he said.

IGERT also responds, in part, to recommendations of the National Academy of Science's Committee on Science, Engineering, and Public Policy (COSEPUP), whose 1995 report, Reshaping the Graduate Education of Scientists and Engineers, advised repairing the "misalignment" between how graduate students are trained and what employers seek. COSEPUP identified communication and teamwork skills, multidisciplinary and applied research experience, and adaptability as essential elements in training.

Graduate students supported under these traineeships will be exposed to multidisciplinary graduate programsdeveloped by the awardee institutionsin emerging areas of science and engineering, areas that penetrate traditional boundaries and unite faculty from several departments and/or institutions. Supported projects are based upon a multidisciplinary research theme and organized around a diverse group of investigators from U.S. doctorate-granting institutions.

In addition to NSF's Office of Polar Programs and institutions in EPSCoR (Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research), all NSF directorates are participating in the IGERT program.

-NSF-

Attachment: List of Integrative Graduate Education Research Grants

Attachment

Integrative Graduate Education and Research Grants
(1998)

This listing of the first round of IGERT awards includes award number, principal investigator, institution, and title. Abstracts can be accessed by award number on the world-wide web at: http://www.nsf.gov/verity/srchawdf.htm

Number

Investigator

Institution

Title

Contact

9870665

Dana Z. Anderson

Univ. of Colorado-Boulder

Graduate Training in Optical Science and Engineering

Jim Scott
303-492-3114

9870720

Gregory W. Auner

Wayne State Univ.

Smart Sensors and Integrated Devices

Tom Tigani
313-577-2150

9870691

Leonaidas G. Bachas

Univ. of KY

Res. Foundation Integrated Sensing Architectures

Carl Nathe
606-257-1754

9870710

Charles DeLisi

Boston University

Graduate Research Training in Bioinformatics

Joan Schwartz
617-353-4626

9870711

Joseph S. Devinny

Univ. of Southern California

Urban Environmental Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Doctoral Education Program

Bob Calverley
213-740-2215

9870633

Timothy J. Ebner

Univ. of MN-Twin Cities

Integrative Graduate Training of Neuroscientists and Computational/ Physical Scientists

Teri Charest
612-624-4604

9870676

Mark E. Johnson

Brown Univ.

Learning and Action in the Face of Uncertainty: Cognitive, Computational and Statistical Approaches

Kristen Lans
401-863-7508

9870668

David M. Mark

SUNY-Buffalo

Integrated Graduate Education and Research Training in Geographic Information Science

Ellen Goldbaum
716-645-2626

9870682

Patricia Mokhtarian

Univ. of California-Davis

Transportation Technology and Policy Program

Sylvia Wright
530-752-7704

9870703

Peter J. Nowak

Univ. of Wisconsin-Madison

Human Dimensions of Social and Aquatic System Interactions

Jeff Iseminger
608-262-8287

9870653

Rebecca Richards-Kortum

Univ. of Texas-Austin

A New Pathway for Multidisciplinary Graduate Education in Optical Molecular Bio Engineering

Robert Meckel
512-475-7847

9870717

Jin-Joo Song

Oklahoma State Univ.

Advanced Graduate Training in Photonics Research

Nestor Gonzales
405-744-6260

9870713

James T. Staley

Univ. of Washington

Astrobiology: Life in and Beyond Earth's Solar System

Vince Stricherz
206-543-2580

9870631

Steven H. Strogatz

Cornell Univ.

Program in Nonlinear Systems

Bill Steele
607-255-7164

9870659

Michael Tabor

Univ. of Arizona

Multidisciplinary Training at the Interface of Biology, Mathematics and Physics

Julieta Gonzales
520-626-4336

9870646

Thomas L. Theis

Clarkson Univ.

Environmental Manufacturing Management

Michael Griffin
315-268-6481

9870661

William J. Wilson

Harvard Univ.

Multidisciplinary Program in Inequality and Social Policy

Susan Green
617-495-1585

-NSF-

 

 
 
     
 

 
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