November 5, 2007 Zegura to Chair GENI Science Council
Ellen Zegura, Professor and Chair of Computer Science at the Georgia Institute of Technology, has been named Chair of the GENI Science Council (GSC).
The GSC was established by the Computing Community Consortium in February 2007 to articulate a visionary and compelling research agenda in networking and related fields, with a particular focus on topics that might require substantial shared research instrumentation such as has been envisioned as GENI, the Global Environment for Network Innovations.
Previously, Zegura co-chaired the GSC with Scott Shenker from UC Berkeley. For personal reasons, Shenker is stepping down as Co-chair, but he will remain a member of the GSC.
The Computing Community Consortium congratulates Ellen, and thanks both Ellen and Scott for their contributions — past and future! — to the GSC.
Further information on the GENI Science Council.
Further information on the Computing Community Consortium.
Update: Zegura has also written a handy guide (pdf) to GENI that helps lay out the case for the project. Definitely worth a read for anyone interested in learning what GENI proposes to accomplish.
Questions about NSF’s new $52 million Cyber-enabled Discovery and Innovation initiative? The Chronicle of Higher Education is hosting a “Brown Bag” discussion on the topic with CDI program director Sirin Tekinay on Thursday, November 8th, at noon ET. You can submit your questions now and Sirin will join the discussion on Thursday with answers.
As we’ve mentioned previously, the CDI initiative is a cross-Foundation initiative aimed at “[broadening] the Nation’s capability for innovation by developing a new generation of computationally based discovery concepts and tools to deal with complex, data-rich and interacting systems.” The $52 million initiative* will be led by CISE (which will control about $20 million), with participation from Engineering, Mathematics and Physical Science, Social, Behavioral and Economic science, Cyberinfrastructure, International Science, and EHR. NSF hopes to grow the program in successive budget years up to $250 million in 2012, with CISE controlling a proportional share. So this is potentially a very big deal.
Tune in to the chat on Thursday and learn more!
* NSF requested $52 million for the program in FY 08, and Congressional appropriators have included full funding for the program in their as-yet-unpassed appropriations bills. However, the Chronicle describes CDI as a $26 million program and I’m not sure where that number came from. In any case, the final total for FY 08 won’t be known until Congress and the President sort out the mess that FY 08 appropriations hasbecome….
A current and several former CRA Board members have been elected as Fellows to the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Section on Information, Computing, and Communication this month. A ceremony honoring them will be held in February 2008 at the AAAS Annual Meeting in Boston. Fellows are elected by their peers for their contributions to science and technology. A full list of the Fellows can be found here.
Current CRA Board member Andrew A. Chien, vice president of Intelís Corporate Technology Group and director of Intel research, is also a fellow of the ACM and the IEEE. He was formerly a professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Former Board members, John L. King, David A. Patterson, and Stuart Feldman, were also elected AAAS Fellows. John is the Vice Provost for Academic Information and a professor at the University of Michigan as well as a fellow of the Association for Information Systems. He is formerly a Fulbright Distinguished Chair. Dave is the E.H. and M.E. Pardee Chair of Computer Science at the University of California, Berkeley and is a fellow of the ACM and IEEE. He also received the CRA Distinguished Service Award. Stu is currently the Vice President, Engineering, East Coast at Google, a position he took recently after his time as Vice President of Computer Science at IBM Research. He is a fellow of the ACM and IEEE and is currently the president of ACM.
Congratulations Andrew, John, Dave, and Stu! AAAS Section on Information, Computing, and Communication Fellows
Werner Braun, University of Texas Medical Branch ï C. Sidney Burrus, Rice University ï Jin-Yi Cai, University of Wisconsin-Madison ï Andrew A. Chien, Intel Corporation ï Tom Dietterich, Oregon State University ï Stuart I. Feldman, IBM Corporation ï Jean-Luc Gaudiot, University of California, Irvine ï Michael T. Goodrich, University of California, Irvine ï David Harel, Weizmann Institute of Science ï John L. King, University of Michigan ï David J. Lilja, University of Minnesota ï Maja J. Mataric¥, University of Southern California ï David A. Patterson, University of California, Berkeley ï David M. Rocke, University of California, Davis ï John R. Rumble, Information International Associates ï David E. Shaw, D. E. Shaw and Co., Inc. ï James J. Thomas, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory ï Fei-Yue Wang, Chinese Academy of Sciences ï Jeannette Wing, Carnegie Mellon University
Two recent Information Week articles are of interest. The first article discusses the Commission on Professionals in Science and Technologys newly released report regarding the IT workforce and the need to increase the representation of women and minorities to keep America competitive. This was a theme at the recent conferences in Florida, the Richard Tapia Celebration of Diversity in Computing and the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Information Technology. The report is free and available at the CPST web site but you do have to register to access it.
The second article is about the National Research Council report encouraging open exchange of science and technology research on the international stage. The article states the Councils understanding that there are matters of national security that the United States is trying to protect by classifying research but that the possibility that the United States might lose its edge in technology and research represents one of the greatest risks to national security. Again the report is available online and is worth reading.
Coverage from the Tapia Conference (previous post)…
Former CRA board member John King kicked off the second day of the Richard Tapia Celebration of Diversity in Computing with a diversity focused plenary emphasizing the evolution of cultural context. Using historical examples Dr. King focused on the changes of the last 200 years in the US that show the progression of society in accepting and celebrating the differences between the majority and the minority groups. He emphasized that the context changes the point of view and different points of view provide more information. That is why diversity is so important.
This echoes strongly the plenary given yesterday afternoon by Norman Johnson of Referentia Systems. His talk discussed the importance of mass knowledge and that the knowledge of large groups is often more accurate than the knowledge of issue area experts. Without diversity, that mass knowledge is, in effect, “dumbed-down.”
A panel discussing why computing departments fail to retain underrepresented students if universities care about diversity noted the need for role models and emphasis on getting underrepresented students through the first year by building community and accepting cultural differences.
More to come…
The government affairs team here at CRA is headed to Orlando next week! I will be bringing you updates from the Richard Tapia Celebration of Diversity in Computing conference and Peter will let you know whats happening at the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing conference. The conferences are co-located this year, so it’ll be interesting to see how that affects the overall dynamic of both conferences. I’m guessing it’ll be a big positive, but we’ll see. Stayed tuned!
October 11, 2007 Four Added to GENI Science Council
The Computing Community Consortium is pleased to announce the addition of four members to the Science Council for the Global Environment for Networking Innovations (GENI). The new members will join 15 current members of the council in providing scientific guidance for the GENI project — a proposed experimental facility to allow research on a wide variety of problems in communications, networking, and distributed systems.
The new members will expand the breadth of research expertise on the GENI Science Council, said Edward Lazowska, Chair of the CCC Council.
The new members:
Joan Feigenbaum, Henry Ford II Professor of Computer Science at Yale University
James A. Hendler, Tetherless World Senior Constellation Chair at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
Michael Kearns, National Center Chair in Resource Management and Technology at the University of Pennsylavnia
Larry Peterson, Chair of Computer Science at Princeton University.
The GENI Science Council was originally established in March 2007 by the CCC, in partnership with the National Science Foundation. The Science Council will produce a comprehensive research plan that describes the scientific and engineering research questions that GENI will make possible to address, the educational opportunities that GENI will afford, and the industrial collaborations the GENI will invite. Members of the GENI Science Council were selected from a pool of more than 100 individuals nominated by the computing community representing roughly 20 research areas.
Further information on the GENI program, including the composition of the Science Council, can be found on the web at http://geni.net.
About CCC: Formed in partnership with the National Science Foundation and the Computing Research Association, the Computing Community Consortium seeks to catalyze the computing research community to debate long-range research challenges, to build consensus around research visions, to articulate those visions, and to develop the most promising visions into clearly defined initiatives. On the web: https://cra.org/ccc
The Senate began consideration of the Commerce, Justice, Science appropriation bill yesterday but put off further consideration of the bill until October 15. Despite the delay, President Bush has released a Statement of Administration Policy (SAP) stating — no surprise — he will veto the bill if it is passed at the current funding levels.
The bill includes $5.156 billion for NSFs Research and Related Activities including $52 million for the Cyber Enabled Discovery and Innovation program, $244.6 million for Major Research Equipment and Facilities Construction, and $850.6 million for Education and Human Resources Directorate – a $100 million increase over the Presidents request. During consideration, an amendment adding $1 billion to the funding of NASA was passed, bringing NASAs total to $18.5 billion within the bill. The bill includes $863 million for NIST including $110 million for the Manufacturing Extension Programs (MEP) and $100 million for the Advanced Technology Program (ATP).
The Administration has many concerns with this bill although they mostly are with the Commerce and Justice parts of the bill. The SAP does oppose the increase to NASA and the extra $100 million for NSFs EHR. The SAP also states opposition to the funding amounts for the MEP and ATP programs, as he has in recent budget years.
Related posts on this topic can be found here.
Good Op-Ed at Forbes.com about the need to invest in science and math education at the K-12 level to keep the US lead in science and technology. It points out that the current challenge to Americas competitive status is not a single high profile event that can galvanize the population but a slow decline in our education process and commitment to science and technology fields that has been happening for years.
Once again, our nation’s educational system has been called into question, as international assessments indicate that our K-12 students lag far behind their peers from dozens of other nations in science and mathematics.
Furthermore, the impending retirement of baby-boom scientists and engineers trained during the post-Sputnik era has led to concerns over potential high-tech workforce shortages. Only 4.7% of undergraduate degrees awarded in the U.S. are in the field of engineering, compared to a staggering 38.6% of those awarded in China. Clearly, our national commitment to engineering and other high-tech fields has waned. As these jobs are playing a larger and larger part in the world economy, our timing is particularly bad.
Furthermore, their success does not spell doom for the U.S. economy as long as we react accordingly: with public investments that allow our students and workers to compete with their international counterparts. By building a solid bedrock of science and math education in grades K-12, we can assure a problem-solving, technically adroit workforce that will keep the U.S. in a position of global leadership.
Computerworld has fantastic coverage of the 50th anniversary of the Sputnik launch (Oct. 4th, 1957) and why, in a sense, we can thank the Soviets for helping create the conditions that led the U.S. to become the technological superpower we’ve become.
Computerworld’s Gary Anthes’ piece “Happy Birthday Sputnik! (Thanks for the Internet)” does a great job of chronicling how the federal government’s reaction to the surprising Soviet launch created an agency and a research funding culture that proved so extraordinarily productive that nearly every billion-dollar sub-sector of the IT economy today bears its stamp. In the process, he checks in with a number of important figures from computer science who note that the productive culture within DARPA responsible for much of that early innovation seems to have waned — and perhaps isn’t even possible today.
Rather than quote snippets from the piece, I’d just encourage you to read all of it — it’s the piece I would’ve tried to write in honor of Sputnik’s 50th if Anthens hadn’t (I’m glad he did…it’s assuredly better than anything I would’ve come up with).
Two other portions of the coverage are worth checking out, too. Computerworld did a pretty good job of simplifying the CSTB’s “tire tracks” chart that shows the development of technologies from the initial research in university or industry labs to the time the products that resulted became billion-dollar industries.
And there’s a good interview with former (D)ARPA director Charles M. Herzfeld on the state of IT research now.
It’s all definitely worth a read.
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Zegura to Chair GENI Science Council
/In: Computing Community Consortium (CCC) /by Peter HarshaAn announcement from the Computing Community Consortium:
Update: Zegura has also written a handy guide (pdf) to GENI that helps lay out the case for the project. Definitely worth a read for anyone interested in learning what GENI proposes to accomplish.
The Chronicle on Cyber-Enabled Discovery and Innovation
/In: Funding, FY08 Appropriations, R&D in the Press, Research /by Peter HarshaQuestions about NSF’s new $52 million Cyber-enabled Discovery and Innovation initiative? The Chronicle of Higher Education is hosting a “Brown Bag” discussion on the topic with CDI program director Sirin Tekinay on Thursday, November 8th, at noon ET. You can submit your questions now and Sirin will join the discussion on Thursday with answers.
As we’ve mentioned previously, the CDI initiative is a cross-Foundation initiative aimed at “[broadening] the Nation’s capability for innovation by developing a new generation of computationally based discovery concepts and tools to deal with complex, data-rich and interacting systems.” The $52 million initiative* will be led by CISE (which will control about $20 million), with participation from Engineering, Mathematics and Physical Science, Social, Behavioral and Economic science, Cyberinfrastructure, International Science, and EHR. NSF hopes to grow the program in successive budget years up to $250 million in 2012, with CISE controlling a proportional share. So this is potentially a very big deal.
Tune in to the chat on Thursday and learn more!
* NSF requested $52 million for the program in FY 08, and Congressional appropriators have included full funding for the program in their as-yet-unpassed appropriations bills. However, the Chronicle describes CDI as a $26 million program and I’m not sure where that number came from. In any case, the final total for FY 08 won’t be known until Congress and the President sort out the mess that FY 08 appropriations has become….
CRA Board Members Elected AAAS Fellows
/In: CRA, People /by MelissaNorrA current and several former CRA Board members have been elected as Fellows to the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Section on Information, Computing, and Communication this month. A ceremony honoring them will be held in February 2008 at the AAAS Annual Meeting in Boston. Fellows are elected by their peers for their contributions to science and technology. A full list of the Fellows can be found here.
Current CRA Board member Andrew A. Chien, vice president of Intelís Corporate Technology Group and director of Intel research, is also a fellow of the ACM and the IEEE. He was formerly a professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Former Board members, John L. King, David A. Patterson, and Stuart Feldman, were also elected AAAS Fellows. John is the Vice Provost for Academic Information and a professor at the University of Michigan as well as a fellow of the Association for Information Systems. He is formerly a Fulbright Distinguished Chair. Dave is the E.H. and M.E. Pardee Chair of Computer Science at the University of California, Berkeley and is a fellow of the ACM and IEEE. He also received the CRA Distinguished Service Award. Stu is currently the Vice President, Engineering, East Coast at Google, a position he took recently after his time as Vice President of Computer Science at IBM Research. He is a fellow of the ACM and IEEE and is currently the president of ACM.
Congratulations Andrew, John, Dave, and Stu!
AAAS Section on Information, Computing, and Communication Fellows
Werner Braun, University of Texas Medical Branch ï C. Sidney Burrus, Rice University ï Jin-Yi Cai, University of Wisconsin-Madison ï Andrew A. Chien, Intel Corporation ï Tom Dietterich, Oregon State University ï Stuart I. Feldman, IBM Corporation ï Jean-Luc Gaudiot, University of California, Irvine ï Michael T. Goodrich, University of California, Irvine ï David Harel, Weizmann Institute of Science ï John L. King, University of Michigan ï David J. Lilja, University of Minnesota ï Maja J. Mataric¥, University of Southern California ï David A. Patterson, University of California, Berkeley ï David M. Rocke, University of California, Davis ï John R. Rumble, Information International Associates ï David E. Shaw, D. E. Shaw and Co., Inc. ï James J. Thomas, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory ï Fei-Yue Wang, Chinese Academy of Sciences ï Jeannette Wing, Carnegie Mellon University
Two Information Week Articles of Interest
/In: American Competitiveness Initiative, Policy, R&D in the Press, Security /by MelissaNorrTwo recent Information Week articles are of interest. The first article discusses the Commission on Professionals in Science and Technologys newly released report regarding the IT workforce and the need to increase the representation of women and minorities to keep America competitive. This was a theme at the recent conferences in Florida, the Richard Tapia Celebration of Diversity in Computing and the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Information Technology. The report is free and available at the CPST web site but you do have to register to access it.
The second article is about the National Research Council report encouraging open exchange of science and technology research on the international stage. The article states the Councils understanding that there are matters of national security that the United States is trying to protect by classifying research but that the possibility that the United States might lose its edge in technology and research represents one of the greatest risks to national security. Again the report is available online and is worth reading.
Tapia Conference Coverage
/In: Diversity in Computing, Events, People /by MelissaNorrCoverage from the Tapia Conference (previous post)…
Former CRA board member John King kicked off the second day of the Richard Tapia Celebration of Diversity in Computing with a diversity focused plenary emphasizing the evolution of cultural context. Using historical examples Dr. King focused on the changes of the last 200 years in the US that show the progression of society in accepting and celebrating the differences between the majority and the minority groups. He emphasized that the context changes the point of view and different points of view provide more information. That is why diversity is so important.
This echoes strongly the plenary given yesterday afternoon by Norman Johnson of Referentia Systems. His talk discussed the importance of mass knowledge and that the knowledge of large groups is often more accurate than the knowledge of issue area experts. Without diversity, that mass knowledge is, in effect, “dumbed-down.”
A panel discussing why computing departments fail to retain underrepresented students if universities care about diversity noted the need for role models and emphasis on getting underrepresented students through the first year by building community and accepting cultural differences.
More to come…
Tapia and Hopper Conferences
/In: Diversity in Computing, Events /by MelissaNorrThe government affairs team here at CRA is headed to Orlando next week! I will be bringing you updates from the Richard Tapia Celebration of Diversity in Computing conference and Peter will let you know whats happening at the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing conference. The conferences are co-located this year, so it’ll be interesting to see how that affects the overall dynamic of both conferences. I’m guessing it’ll be a big positive, but we’ll see. Stayed tuned!
Four Added to GENI Science Council
/In: Computing Community Consortium (CCC) /by Peter HarshaAn announcement from your friends at the Computing Community Consortium:
Senate CJS Approps Considered, Veto Threat Issued
/In: American Competitiveness Initiative, Funding, FY08 Appropriations /by MelissaNorrThe Senate began consideration of the Commerce, Justice, Science appropriation bill yesterday but put off further consideration of the bill until October 15. Despite the delay, President Bush has released a Statement of Administration Policy (SAP) stating — no surprise — he will veto the bill if it is passed at the current funding levels.
The bill includes $5.156 billion for NSFs Research and Related Activities including $52 million for the Cyber Enabled Discovery and Innovation program, $244.6 million for Major Research Equipment and Facilities Construction, and $850.6 million for Education and Human Resources Directorate – a $100 million increase over the Presidents request. During consideration, an amendment adding $1 billion to the funding of NASA was passed, bringing NASAs total to $18.5 billion within the bill. The bill includes $863 million for NIST including $110 million for the Manufacturing Extension Programs (MEP) and $100 million for the Advanced Technology Program (ATP).
The Administration has many concerns with this bill although they mostly are with the Commerce and Justice parts of the bill. The SAP does oppose the increase to NASA and the extra $100 million for NSFs EHR. The SAP also states opposition to the funding amounts for the MEP and ATP programs, as he has in recent budget years.
Related posts on this topic can be found here.
Sputnik Anniversary Compels Look at K-12 Education
/In: American Competitiveness Initiative /by MelissaNorrGood Op-Ed at Forbes.com about the need to invest in science and math education at the K-12 level to keep the US lead in science and technology. It points out that the current challenge to Americas competitive status is not a single high profile event that can galvanize the population but a slow decline in our education process and commitment to science and technology fields that has been happening for years.
It also calls on the government to implement the recommendations of the National Science Board report A National Action Plan for Addressing the Critical Needs of the U.S. Science, Technoloogy, Engineering, and Mathematics Education System. (PDF)
Computerworld on Sputnik, DARPA and Computing
/In: Funding, People, Policy, R&D in the Press, Research, Security /by Peter HarshaComputerworld has fantastic coverage of the 50th anniversary of the Sputnik launch (Oct. 4th, 1957) and why, in a sense, we can thank the Soviets for helping create the conditions that led the U.S. to become the technological superpower we’ve become.
Computerworld’s Gary Anthes’ piece “Happy Birthday Sputnik! (Thanks for the Internet)” does a great job of chronicling how the federal government’s reaction to the surprising Soviet launch created an agency and a research funding culture that proved so extraordinarily productive that nearly every billion-dollar sub-sector of the IT economy today bears its stamp. In the process, he checks in with a number of important figures from computer science who note that the productive culture within DARPA responsible for much of that early innovation seems to have waned — and perhaps isn’t even possible today.
Rather than quote snippets from the piece, I’d just encourage you to read all of it — it’s the piece I would’ve tried to write in honor of Sputnik’s 50th if Anthens hadn’t (I’m glad he did…it’s assuredly better than anything I would’ve come up with).
Two other portions of the coverage are worth checking out, too. Computerworld did a pretty good job of simplifying the CSTB’s “tire tracks” chart that shows the development of technologies from the initial research in university or industry labs to the time the products that resulted became billion-dollar industries.
And there’s a good interview with former (D)ARPA director Charles M. Herzfeld on the state of IT research now.
It’s all definitely worth a read.