Oregon State University (OSU) has received $480,000 in funding from the National Science Foundation to incentivise innovation in research.
The grant will allow the university to add innovation and entrepreneurial activities to the criteria for staff promotion and tenure.
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Rich Carter, faculty lead for innovation excellence in the OSU Research Office, said: “This grant has the potential to cause a fundamental shift in how faculty are incentibised and rewarded for their research endevours.
“It has the chance to create a seismic shift for what sort of research is focused on, to incentivise researchers to think about the societal impact of their work.”
This sort of research focuses on what employers need by helping students understand the connection between the market and the science.
– Rich Carter, OSU
Carter also noted that incentivising research with societal impact will mean “significant training potential for the students involved in the research.”
“This sort of research focuses on what employers need by helping students understand the connection between the market and the science,” Carter added. “Using innovation and entrepreneurship as part of the promotion and tenure guidelines will transform the way university research is valued in an additive sense. We don’t want to replace anything; we just want to more inclusively recognise the full breadth of research opportunities for faculty and students in the 21st century.”
More information about the National Science Foundation is available at https://www.nsf.gov
