Public Affairs:

Announcements

Open Calls for Research Proposals (August 31, 2009) - Beginning early 2010, the Institute's Tiffin Center for Humaneering Technology Research, Transfer and Commercialization will augment the current Stage One practice of privately soliciting scholars for discipline-specific and trans-disciplinary synthesis papers, testing a new open "call for papers" process that invites all interested scholars to submit papers on solicited topics. This change, even though just a test, will immediately open the door for much broader scholar participation in the humaneering technology development process.

According to Board director, Don Combs, "It has been the Institute's goal from the start to have the development process be as open and inclusive as possible. However the overall limited awareness of the Institute, the goal of involving a globally diverse group of scholars, and the convenience of utilizing scholars whose work is already application focused, system-based, and cross-disciplinary led to the current private solicitation process. Now that we have the humaneering technology development process operational, we are interested in testing potential enhancements."

This new open "call for papers" process will follow the same two-step submittal procedure already used by the Tiffin Center in other situations. Trying to be considerate of the time pressures already faced by scholars, this procedure gives scholars the option to first submit a short-form proposal that briefly outlines the approach and strengths planned for their paper. Tiffin Center staff will then reply to these short-form proposals, typically within a week, indicating the project director's level of interest in the proposed paper, making suggestions that could increase this interest, and sometimes suggesting other papers or projects for which the scholars' interests are well aligned. Scholars can prepare the paper as originally conceived, submit a revised short-form proposal, or withdraw their interest in the paper, perhaps to focus on an alternative paper or project that was mentioned. Experience shows that this two-step procedure results in greater scholar interest, improves the quality of papers received, and often helps to align scholars and the Tiffin Center on other projects.

The test period is projected to begin in February 2010, and the specific application topics being solicited will be posted, with an Announcement and link clearly posted on the Institute home page. Scholars interested in getting involved in the development of humaneering technology are encouraged to propose a paper. The path to becoming the PI for a client-funded Stage Three or Stage Four field application research experiment, or many other interesting roles, for a project or for several years, can begin with an impressive response to an open call for papers.