September 12, 2014
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CONGRESS
AND THE BUDGET
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HOUSE puts off vote on stopgap spending bill
A planned Sept. 11 vote was delayed until next week -- maybe until Wednesday, Sept. 17 -- as the House
weighed how to respond to President Obama's last-minute request for
funding to fight the Islamic State. The planned House measure would
have continued funding
government operations through Dec. 11, avoiding a government shutdown
when the new fiscal years starts Oct. 1. Action on a longer-term
appropropriations "omnibus" -- folding in spending decisions made by
appropriators -- will likely depend on whether the November elections
give Republicans control of the Senate. CQ reports that if the House
votes on a continuing resolution Wednesday, the Senate wouldn't take it
up until Thursday at the earliest, and votes on final passage might not
occur until the week of Sept. 22. Government Executive quotes House Speaker John Boehner as saying of Obama's request, "Frankly, we ought to give the president what he's been asking for."
HEARING OR SCOLDING? White House science adviser John Holdren is due to testify Sept. 17 before the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee,
along with Janet McCabe, the Environmental Protection Agency's acting
assistant administrator for air and radiation. But the title of the
hearing suggests that the panel's GOP majority has already reached a
conclusion: The Administration's Climate Plan: Failure by Design. Tune
in for a webcast.
TEAM OF RIVALS: In
an unusual show of bipartisanship just weeks before the election, the
House Subcommittee on Energy and Power plans a hearing next week on the
21st Century Energy Workforce Development Jobs Initiative Act,
introduced by Rep. Bobby Rush, (D-Ill.) and subcommittee Chairman Ed
Whitfield (R-Ky.) and co-sponsored by prominent members of the
Congressional Black Caucus. The bill directs the Department of Energy "to
establish a comprehensive program to improve the education and training
of workers for energy-related jobs, with emphasis on increasing the
number of skilled minorities and women." DOE would identify the
skills need, including several fields of engineering. Rush defeated
then-37-year-old Barack Obama in a 2000 primary in what the New York
Times later called the future president's "one glaring episode of
political miscalculation." Whitfield's home state is the scene of a
tight Senate race that Democrats hope will topple Senate Republican
Leader Mitch McConnell and help them hold onto the upper chamber. The
Committee has posted a report
from the American Petroleum Institute on the impact of the U.S. oil and
natural gas boom on economic growth. The Department of Energy is
currently working with API, the American Association of Blacks in
Energy, and Hispanics in Energy on a series of workforce-development summits.
ASTEROID MINING: Anticipating the era of commercial space exploration, sponsors of the ASTEROIDS Act
want to make sure American companies get to keep what they find up
there. The bill directs the federal government to promote development
of a commercial asteroid industry and "discourage government barriers"
to same. It also "recognizes that any resources obtained in outer space
from an asteroid are the property of the entity that obtained them." A hearing this week on the bill drew a mixed reception, Space News reports, with a space-law expert noting that resource extraction is a contentious issue between nations.
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DATA
POINTS
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LOW PH.D. JOBLESS RATE, BUT HIGHER AMONG BLACKS
Source: National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics, NSF
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THE ADMINISTRATION AND RESEARCH AGENCIES
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PAST RADICAL TIES SEND PROGRAM OFFICER HOME
Valerie
Barr's anticipated two-year stint as a computer science program
director at the National Science Foundation was cut short after an
Office of Personnel Management probe uncovered her connection in the
1980s to the left-wing Women’s Committee Against Genocide and
the New Movement in Solidarity with Puerto Rican Independence. Federal
investigators say the two groups were linked to the May 19 Communist
Organization, which carried out a series of violent attacks that
included the killing of two police officers and a security guard.
Barr's responses to questions, according to OPM, "constituted
a deliberate misrepresentation, falsification, deceit, or omission of
material fact." Jeff Mervis, who wrote a lengthy account in Science, reports that the case "provides a rare glimpse of . . . an obscure agency (OPM) within the White House that wields
vast power over the entire federal bureaucracy through its authority to
vet recently hired workers." Barr, who had been listed as part of the Improving Undergraduate STEM Education program, has returned to her tenured professorship at Union College.
RED ALERT:
Revolutionizing Engineering Departments
(RED) an initiative of NSF's Engineering Directorate, together with
Computer Information Science, and Engineering and Education and Human
Resources, "is the first phase of a multi-year initiative, the Professional Formation of Engineers,
to create and support an innovative and inclusive engineering
profession. Learn more during a webinar Sept. 23. Tune in Oct. 7 for a webinar on Natural Hazards Engineering Research Infrastructure.
heads up for two-year colleges: NSF's
Advanced Technological Education program "focuses on the education of
technicians for the high-technology fields" driving the economy,
drawing in partnerships between academic institutions and industry.
Learn about funding.
 ENERGY AND ADVANCED MANUFACTURING:
The Department of Energy and the Council on Competitiveness plan an American Manufacturing and Competitiveness Summit next week featuring leaders from DOE, industry, and academe.
A FEW GOOD MENTORS: Nominations are due October 3 for the Presidential
Awards for Excellence in Science, Mathematics and Engineering Mentoring
(PAESMEN). The award "recognizes individuals for their mentoring
of persons from underrepresented racial and ethnic groups, women,
persons with disabilities, persons from disadvantaged socioeconomic
backgrounds, and early career scientists and engineers."
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NATIONAL ACADEMIES
INTERNATIONAL COLLABORATION: A National Academies report summarizes a workshop on research agreements "affecting or involving
people/human subjects; environmental and natural resources; science,
engineering, and manufacturing; and agriculture and animal issues," and "the role that culture and
cultural expectations" can play.
HIGH-SKILLED IMMIGRATION: An
Academies conference in Washington Sept. 22 and 23 will examine how
several industrialized countries treat temporary and permanent
immigrants with advanced training, particicularly in science,
engineering, and software development.
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PUBLIC
POLICY AND HIGHER
ED
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graduate and mid-career salaries: Harvey Mudd College "once again has alumni who report the highest
mid-career (10 years of experience or more) salaries, both for alumni
who only earn a bachelor's degree ($133,800) and all graduates
($137,800)," PayScale reports. "While schools with a heavier
liberal arts concentration tend to rank lower for early career salaries,
several liberal arts colleges report impressive mid-career median
salaries, especially when alumni who go on to receive advanced degrees
are included in the mix. Notable examples are Washington and Lee
University (median mid-career salary for all graduates: $133,500);
Colgate University (median mid-career salary for all graduates:
$122,000); and Williams College (median mid-career salary for all
graduates: $114,500)."
FLYING IN TANDEM: Boeing
has helped bring together Georgia Tech, Brigham Young, Purdue,
Tuskegee, and Embry Riddle in which students design, build, and fly
drones as part of a capstone project. This year's drones will be
designed for launch in disaster areas to help first responders. Inside Higher Ed reports on the effort.
FOND MEMORIES: Brendan Iribe dropped out of the University of Maryland during his freshman year and went on to "extraordinary successes in
video-game technology . . . . His latest venture,
Oculus VR, which developed the Oculus Rift virtual-reality headset, sold
to Facebook for $2 billion this year," the Washington Post reports. Now he's pledged $31 million -- the school's biggest donation to date -- to fund
scholarships and a new computer science building.
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ASEE
& COMMUNITY NEWS
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PATHWAYS TO INNOVATION: Engineering deans are invited to join the Pathways to Innovation program, run by the Epicenter at Stanford. It's designed "to help
institutions transform the experience of their undergraduate engineering
students and fully incorporate innovation and entrepreneurship into a range of
courses as well as strengthen co- and extra-curricular offerings." Teams receive "access to models for
integrating entrepreneurship into engineering curriculum, custom online
resources, guidance from a community of engineering and entrepreneurship
faculty, and membership in a national network of schools with similar goals. See the call for proposals. For more information, contact Liz Nilsen at lnilsen@nciia.org
THE SOCIETY OF PROFESSIONAL HISPANIC ENGINEERS (shpe) Deans’ Summit will take
place in Detroit, Michigan on Friday morning, November 7 as a part of the
annual SHPE National Conference. The Summit will focus on the challenge
of building a diverse pipeline of engineering students. Leaders
from SHPE, the National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE),
and the Society of Women Engineers (SWE) will present their current efforts
and needs for support in this area. The goal is to develop recommendations and
actions to strengthen the ties between these organizations, academia and
industry. Please RSVP via http://tinyurl.com/2014SHPE no later than October 1,
2014.
ENGINEERING EDUCATION FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT: The Seventh International Conference on Engineering Education for Sustainable Development
(EESD15) "will
explore current and future ways of thinking in the emerging field" and
the groundbreaking worth since 2002. It will be held June 9-12, 2015 at
the University of British
Columbia’s (UBC) Point Grey campus. 7 of EESD and
will celebrate the ground-breaking work accomplishing in EESD since 2002.
The conference will be held from June 9-12, 2015 at the University of British
Columbia’s (UBC) Point Grey campus in Vancouver. See the conference themes. Abstracts are due October 13.
REGISTER FOR ETLI: The
Engineering Technology Leadership Institute is set for Oct. 10 in
Crystal City, across the Potomac from Washington DC. The session brings
engineering technology educators together to discuss topics of
importance to the discipline and plan for the future. Find
out more.
start preparing abstracts: The
abstract submission phase opened Sept. 2, 2014 for the 2015 ASEE
Annual Conference and Exposition in Seattle. The Calls for Papers from
various divisions can be found here.
 TAKING THE LEAD: The
Society of Women Engineers (SWE) is hosting a workshop entitled
Academic Leadership for Women in Engineering at the WE14+ICWES16 Annual
Conference in Los Angeles on Oct. 24 and 25. There will be a specific
focus on best practices central to leadership in academia. Click here to learn
more and apply to attend the workshop.
Please complete the participant application by August 25. Funded
through support from the Henry Luce Foundation, the workshop is free to
all who are accepted. Contact learning@swe.org with any questions.
ON-LINE STEM
SUSTAINABILITY LIBRARY: This on-line library of
over 1700 juried articles and 300 videos was developed at James Madison
University with NSF funding. The site provides resources for those
researching or teaching sustainability across contexts.
ANNUAL
CONFERENCE - STORIFY VERSION: ASEE's
Engineering Libraries Division has put together a lively collection of
photos and tweets that captures the collaboration and camaraderie
of the Indy conference. Check it out here.
DEANS' FORUM ON
HISPANIC HIGHER EDUCATION
The
Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities (HACU) invites
engineering deans and chairs to the Third Annual Deans’ Forum on
Hispanic
Higher Education: Advancing Graduate School Opportunities and Success
for
Hispanic Students, following HACU’s 28th Annual Conference, Tuesday,
Oct. 7,
2014, 8:30 a.m. - 1:30 p.m. The forum will address issues facing
Hispanic
students in graduate education and highlight promising practices to
enhance
access and success. For more information, see http://www.hacu.net/hacu/Deans_Forum.asp.
‘PROFILES’
IS OUT: ASEE's
eagerly awaited 540-page Profiles of
Engineering and Engineering Technology Colleges has been
published. Call ASEE (202-331-3500) to order a copy.
ASEE DIVERSITY
COMMITTEE NEWSLETTER: The
spring edition of the semi-annual newsletter is now
available. ASEE Past President J.P. Mohsen discusses a proposed
Year of
Dialogue on Diversity and details on safe zone ally training at the
annual
conference are posted, among other items.
VIDEOS
OF
THE PPC: View sessions from February's Public
Policy Colloquium of the Engineering Deans Council dealing with
advanced manufacturing, federal R&D, and K-12 engineering.
STAY
UP TO DATE
on ASEE's Retention Project by
clicking here
for updates.
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EDITOR: Mark Matthews;
CONTRIBUTOR:
William E. Kelly; NEW MASTHEAD DESIGN by Francis Igot,
incorporating the new ASEE logo.
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