Optimizing the Nation's Investment in Academic Research


Book Description

Research universities are critical contributors to our national research enterprise. They are the principal source of a world-class labor force and fundamental discoveries that enhance our lives and the lives of others around the world. These institutions help to create an educated citizenry capable of making informed and crucial choices as participants in a democratic society. However many are concerned that the unintended cumulative effect of federal regulations undercuts the productivity of the research enterprise and diminishes the return on the federal investment in research. Optimizing the Nation's Investment in Academic Research reviews the regulatory framework as it currently exists, considers specific regulations that have placed undue and often unanticipated burdens on the research enterprise, and reassesses the process by which these regulations are created, reviewed, and retired. This review is critical to strengthen the partnership between the federal government and research institutions, to maximize the creation of new knowledge and products, to provide for the effective training and education of the next generation of scholars and workers, and to optimize the return on the federal investment in research for the benefit of the American people.




Optimizing the Nation's Investment in Academic Research:


Book Description

Research universities are critical contributors to our national research enterprise. They are the principal source of a world-class labor force and fundamental discoveries that enhance our lives and the lives of others around the world. These institutions help to create an educated citizenry capable of making informed and crucial choices as participants in a democratic society. However many are concerned that the unintended cumulative effect of federal regulations undercuts the productivity of the research enterprise and diminishes the return on the federal investment in research. Optimizing the Nation's Investment in Academic Research reviews the regulatory framework as it currently exists, considers specific regulations that have placed undue and often unanticipated burdens on the research enterprise, and reassesses the process by which these regulations are created, reviewed, and retired. This review is critical to strengthen the partnership between the federal government and research institutions, to maximize the creation of new knowledge and products, to provide for the effective training and education of the next generation of scholars and workers, and to optimize the return on the federal investment in research for the benefit of the American people.




Demystifying the Academic Research Enterprise


Book Description

What next-generation scholars need to know in order to thrive, and how they can actively participate in shaping the academic research enterprise. The academic research enterprise is highly complex, involving multiple sectors of society and a vast array of approaches. In Demystifying the Academic Research Enterprise, Kelvin K. Droegemeier shows next-generation scholars across all disciplines how to become more productive earlier in their career, as well as how to help shape the academic research enterprise. The topics covered include public perceptions of scholarly work and its use in policy; understanding the big picture of funding and national priorities as well as identifying funding sources; research methods; collecting data and materials; writing grant proposals; publishing results; ethical conduct; bias and peer review; intellectual property and compliance regulations; partnerships and collaboration; diversity, equity, and inclusion; and the future of research. Droegemeier’s two principal goals are to enhance and accelerate scholars’ understanding of the academic research process and to democratize that understanding, particularly at institutions that traditionally are underrepresented or lack robust resources. While intended for undergraduate and graduate students, postdoctoral scholars, and early career faculty, Demystifying the Academic Research Enterprise is also relevant to mid-career and senior faculty, research administrators, funding organizations, congressional staff, policymakers, and the general public. Droegemeier places scholars in a broader national and international context—not as passive recipients of the existing system but as key actors who actively participate in helping to set priorities, determine policies, drive systemic change, and advance knowledge.




Sludge


Book Description

How we became so burdened by red tape and unnecessary paperwork, and why we must do better. We've all had to fight our way through administrative sludge--filling out complicated online forms, mailing in paperwork, standing in line at the motor vehicle registry. This kind of red tape is a nuisance, but, as Cass Sunstein shows in Sludge, it can also also impair health, reduce growth, entrench poverty, and exacerbate inequality. Confronted by sludge, people just give up--and lose a promised outcome: a visa, a job, a permit, an educational opportunity, necessary medical help. In this lively and entertaining look at the terribleness of sludge, Sunstein explains what we can do to reduce it. Because of sludge, Sunstein, explains, too many people don't receive benefits to which they are entitled. Sludge even prevents many people from exercising their constitutional rights--when, for example, barriers to voting in an election are too high. (A Sludge Reduction Act would be a Voting Rights Act.) Sunstein takes readers on a tour of the not-so-wonderful world of sludge, describes justifications for certain kinds of sludge, and proposes "Sludge Audits" as a way to measure the effects of sludge. On balance, Sunstein argues, sludge infringes on human dignity, making people feel that their time and even their lives don't matter. We must do better.




Research Methods in Human-Computer Interaction


Book Description

Research Methods in Human-Computer Interaction is a comprehensive guide to performing research and is essential reading for both quantitative and qualitative methods. Since the first edition was published in 2009, the book has been adopted for use at leading universities around the world, including Harvard University, Carnegie-Mellon University, the University of Washington, the University of Toronto, HiOA (Norway), KTH (Sweden), Tel Aviv University (Israel), and many others. Chapters cover a broad range of topics relevant to the collection and analysis of HCI data, going beyond experimental design and surveys, to cover ethnography, diaries, physiological measurements, case studies, crowdsourcing, and other essential elements in the well-informed HCI researcher's toolkit. Continual technological evolution has led to an explosion of new techniques and a need for this updated 2nd edition, to reflect the most recent research in the field and newer trends in research methodology. This Research Methods in HCI revision contains updates throughout, including more detail on statistical tests, coding qualitative data, and data collection via mobile devices and sensors. Other new material covers performing research with children, older adults, and people with cognitive impairments. - Comprehensive and updated guide to the latest research methodologies and approaches, and now available in EPUB3 format (choose any of the ePub or Mobi formats after purchase of the eBook) - Expanded discussions of online datasets, crowdsourcing, statistical tests, coding qualitative data, laws and regulations relating to the use of human participants, and data collection via mobile devices and sensors - New material on performing research with children, older adults, and people with cognitive impairments, two new case studies from Google and Yahoo!, and techniques for expanding the influence of your research to reach non-researcher audiences, including software developers and policymakers




Schools and Health


Book Description

Schools and Health is a readable and well-organized book on comprehensive school health programs (CSHPs) for children in grades K-12. The book explores the needs of today's students and how those needs can be met through CSHP design and development. The committee provides broad recommendations for CSHPs, with suggestions and guidelines for national, state, and local actions. The volume examines how communities can become involved, explores models for CSHPs, and identifies elements of successful programs. Topics include: The history of and precedents for health programs in schools. The state of the art in physical education, health education, health services, mental health and pupil services, and nutrition and food services. Policies, finances, and other elements of CSHP infrastructure. Research and evaluation challenges. Schools and Health will be important to policymakers in health and education, school administrators, school physicians and nurses, health educators, social scientists, child advocates, teachers, and parents.







Fostering Integrity in Research


Book Description

The integrity of knowledge that emerges from research is based on individual and collective adherence to core values of objectivity, honesty, openness, fairness, accountability, and stewardship. Integrity in science means that the organizations in which research is conducted encourage those involved to exemplify these values in every step of the research process. Understanding the dynamics that support â€" or distort â€" practices that uphold the integrity of research by all participants ensures that the research enterprise advances knowledge. The 1992 report Responsible Science: Ensuring the Integrity of the Research Process evaluated issues related to scientific responsibility and the conduct of research. It provided a valuable service in describing and analyzing a very complicated set of issues, and has served as a crucial basis for thinking about research integrity for more than two decades. However, as experience has accumulated with various forms of research misconduct, detrimental research practices, and other forms of misconduct, as subsequent empirical research has revealed more about the nature of scientific misconduct, and because technological and social changes have altered the environment in which science is conducted, it is clear that the framework established more than two decades ago needs to be updated. Responsible Science served as a valuable benchmark to set the context for this most recent analysis and to help guide the committee's thought process. Fostering Integrity in Research identifies best practices in research and recommends practical options for discouraging and addressing research misconduct and detrimental research practices.




Optimization and Decision Science: Operations Research, Inclusion and Equity


Book Description

This volume collects peer-reviewed short papers presented at the Optimization and Decision Science conference (ODS 2022) held in Florence (Italy) from August 30th to September 2nd, 2022, organized by the Global Optimization Laboratory within the University of Florence and AIRO (the Italian Association for Operations Research). The book includes contributions in the fields of operations research, optimization, problem solving, decision making and their applications in the most diverse domains. Moreover, a special focus is set on the challenging theme Operations Research: inclusion and equity. The work offers 30 contributions, covering a wide spectrum of methodologies and applications. Specifically, they feature the following topics: (i) Variational Inequalities, Equilibria and Games, (ii) Optimization and Machine Learning, (iii) Global Optimization, (iv) Optimization under Uncertainty, (v) Combinatorial Optimization, (vi) Transportation and Mobility, (vii) Health Care Management, and (viii) Applications. This book is primarily addressed to researchers and PhD students of the operations research community. However, due to its interdisciplinary content, it will be of high interest for other closely related research communities.




Guidelines for Optimizing the Risk and Cost of Materials QA Programs


Book Description

TRB’s National Cooperative Highway Research Program (NCHRP) Research Report 838: Guidelines for Optimizing the Risk and Cost of Materials QA Programs proposes guidelines for optimizing the risk and cost of materials quality assurance (QA) programs. It develops a methodology for establishing a materials QA program that optimizes risk and cost by providing appropriate types, levels, and frequencies of agency testing and inspection for transportation projects across their full range of type, size, complexity, and project-delivery method.