CETL/CEISMC Paper on Educational Initiatives in Grant Proposals Awarded Top Honors in the PIC IV division of the ASEE
by Andrew Kerr
Updated July 31, 2009
A paper authored by Center for the Enhancement of Teaching & Learning (CETL) Director Donna Llewellyn, CEISMC Senior Research Scientist Marion Usselman, and CEISMC Director Richard Millman won first place in the American Society for Engineering Education's (ASEE) New Engineering Educators (NEE) Division, and went on to win best paper for the Professional Interest Council (PIC) IV, a major division of the ASEE of which the NEE is one part.
The paper, titled “Designing Effective Educational Initiatives for Grant Proposals," is a candid assessment of university educational outreach and offers useful suggestions to college faculty on how best to find balance between research (the bread-and-butter of most faculty careers) and supporting educational initiatives. (Read the paper here.)
"The paper came out of many years of both Donna Llewellyn and me advising faculty, particularly young assistant professors, on how they can create educational initiatives that make sense for both the audience and for themselves," says Dr. Usselman. "As we tell the faculty, a good educational component will not get you an NSF award, but a bad one will certainly lose you one. We decided to write down our advice in paper form for use by young faculty in particular."
Dr. Llewellyn and Dr. Usselman regularly advise Georgia Tech faculty on grant proposals that contain educational components, and the number of faculty coming to them for assistance has risen steadily over the last 10 years, in part due to the National Science Foundation's emphasis that grantees specify how their grants impact the broader community.
However, "It is your research that will continue to get you grants, not your educational initiative," says Usselman. The paper's final pages advise young faculty to put research well ahead of educational initiative--at least until they have received tenure.
Dr. Millman dedicated his portion of the paper to his late father, Jacob Millman, a Columbia University professor whose textbooks on electronics were landmark works in that field.