CAREER Program Development

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CAREER Program Development

• George Hazelrigg
• Jian Cao
• 2005 CAREER Proposal Writing Workshop
• Columbia University
• May 24, 2005

CAREER Proposal Writing Workshop
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Workshop Goals

• Provide potential CAREER awardees with
  recommendations on developing a CAREER plan
• What is a CAREER proposal? The Larger Contexts
• DOs and DONTs
• Getting a Research Topic
• Finding a Home
• The Summary
• Intellectual Merit and Broader Impacts
• Getting Involved

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CAREER Award

• Funds the academic career development of new
  faculty
• CAREER Development Plan well argued specific
  proposal for activities that will build a firm
  foundation for a life-time of integrated
  contributions to research and education
• Duration 5 years
• Min (in most programs, its also a Max.) amount
  400,000
• Deadline for engineering July 21, 2004 (for 2005
  and beyond, see solicitations)

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You

• Who are you?
• Your expertise/interests
• Your career/life goals
• Your position/resources
• Your proposal should fit into your life plan

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Your Strategic Plan

• A strategic plan has three parts
• Where are you today?
• Where do you want to be in the future (5, 10, 20
  years from now)?
• How do you get from here to there?

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Your Proposal

• Should advance you toward your life goals
• Should be a stepping stone to the next thing
• Should be compatible with your institutions
  goals
• Should represent a contribution to society at
  large

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DOs

• Have a strategic plan
• Build on your strengths
• Differentiate this proposal from your Ph.D.
  thesis work and other sponsored work
• Perform thorough literature search and
  exploratory research before writing the proposal
• www.fastlane.nsf.gov
• Journal articles (update with personal contact)
• Establish and keep your contacts

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DONTs

• Rush
• Wait until last minute (1 month) to contact
  program directors
• Make the proposed work (research and education)
  too broad
• Make the proposed work too narrow
• Ask for too much money
• Ignore rules (Grant Proposal Guide) and misc.
  items

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Getting a Research Topic
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NSF

• We look for proposals that
• Are innovative and push the frontiers of
  knowledge
• Contribute to national needs and priorities
• Go beyond marginalia
• Integrate well with educational goals
• Involve research
• We do not support (except as incidental to the
  research goals of the research)
• Developmental efforts
• Computer programming
• Design of
• Commercialization

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The Research Topic

• It must be research
• It must not have been done before
• It must be significant
• There must be higher than probability zero that
  you can do it
• It must lend itself to a viable research plan
• You must have the facilities to accomplish the
  research
• It should fit into your strategic plan

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What is Research?

• Research is the process of finding out something
  that we (everyone) dont already know
• Scientific research builds upon the extant
  knowledge base and it is repeatable and verifiable

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Groundwork

• Do you know in your field
• What is the current state-of-the-art
• Who are the top ten researchers
• What they are doing right now
• Where they get their funding
• What they consider to be the key research issues
• Who would likely review your proposal
• What the grant opportunities are

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The Research Objective

• This is probably the hardest part of the proposal
• Examples of how not to do it
• The objective of my research is to provide a
  quantum leap in manufacturing silicon wafers.
• The goal of this project is to develop an
  integrated modeling tool for the hardening
  process.
• The goal of this project is to develop innovative
  advances to enhance wire sawing processes.
• Rapid prototyping machines are an important part
  of the vast array of tools. This research will
  bridge the accuracy gap in these processes by
  developing theoretical and technological means to
  implement significant gains in accuracy.

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The Research Objective

• How to do it right
• The research objective of this proposal is to
  determine which physical phenomena govern chip
  formation in brittle materials, and to
  mathematically model those phenomena.
• The research goal of this project is to account
  for uncertainty in engineering design through the
  application of utility theory.

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Finding a Home
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Questions

• Is your research research?
• If it isnt, it doesnt belong at NSF
• If the answer is no, skip to the end, look for
  support from other sources
• If the answer is yes, what is your research
  topic?
• The right NSF home for your research depends on
  the topic of your research, not on the
  application of your research
• Be prepared to answer the question What is your
  research objective? (25 words or less)

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Your Funding Base

• NSF should not be the sole source of funding for
  your research
• Internal support
• State support
• Industry support
• Other Federal agency support

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Directorate for Engineering FY 05 Request
Assistant Director John A. Brighton Deputy
Assistant Director Michael Reischman
Senior Advisors Mike Rocco Priscilla Nelson Bruce
Kramer
448.7M (212M fenced)
30.5 CGIs
49.8M
85.5M
67.2M
Civil Mechanical Systems Galip Ulsoy
Bioengineering Environmental Systems Bruce
Hamilton
Chemical Transport Systems Richard O. Buckius
Design, Manufacture Industrial
Innovation Warren DeVries
Electrical Communications Systems Vasu Varadan
Engineering Education Centers Gary A. Gabriele
62.2M Academic
72.7M
111.3M
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Division of Design, Manufacture, and Industrial
Innovation

• Academic Research Programs
• Manufacturing Processes and Equipment Systems
  Cluster
• Materials Processing Manufacturing (MPM)
• Manufacturing Machines and Equipment (MME)
• Nanomanufacturing (NM)
• Engineering Decision Systems Cluster
• Manufacturing Enterprise Systems (MES)
• Engineering Design (ED)
• Operations Research (OR)
• Service Enterprise System (SES)
• Bridging Programs Across NSF
• Innovation and Organizational Change (IOC)
• Grant Opportunities for Academic Liaison with
  Industry (GOALI)

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• MME (Hazelrigg)
• Material Removal
• Path Planning
• Machine Design
• Metrology
• SSF

• NM (Lyons)
• Directed
• self-assembly
• Patterning
• 100 nm and
• under

• MPM (Cao)
• Forming
• Joining
• Molding
• Deposition/Powder
• Processing

Sensors/Control Optimization

• Composites
• Bulk materials
• Multi-scale

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DMII Academic Research Topics
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Should I Meet My Program Officer?

• Why? What do you intend to gain?
• Or is your goal to schmooze? (It doesnt help)
• Dont even think about taking your program
  officer to lunch
• If you decide to meet
• Be prepared to listen (you dont learn by
  talking)
• Be prepared with questions
• Remember, the program officer is not the panel
• You can get a free trip to NSF (more later)

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Questions You Shouldnt Ask a Program Director

• Is NSF interested in my topic?
• So, will you fund my research?
• Is this a good research topic?
• What research topic do you think I should work
  on?
• What are my odds?
• But this is my last chance, what can I do?
• If I send a copy of my proposal to you, will you
  help me edit it?

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Catch 22

• My research doesnt fit in any single NSF
  program, how about joint submission/review?
• Did you formulate a clear research objective?
• Is your research objective too broad?
• Do you want to consider focusing your scope?
• Suppose my research really does span multiple
  programs?
• Contact all relevant program directors

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How Could a Meeting Help?

• Your program director can
• Give advice on proposal submission
• Help you understand a review of a previous
  proposal
• Point you to resources you can use to help write
  a better proposal next time
• Give general guidance on good proposal writing
• Give you ideas for collaborations

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How Could a Meeting Help?
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Writing the Summary
NSF Design, Service and Manufacturing Grantees
and Research Conference
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Writing the Summary

• The most important statement is your statement of
  the research objective
• It should be sentence 1 of paragraph 1
• Do not begin with a weather report The sky is
  falling. Tools are breaking. Designs are
  failing
• Do not begin with a state-of-the-union address
  Business is moving off shore. Manufacturing is
  going to the
• Remember, this is not a tech paper, it is not a
  murder mystery (where we find out what the
  objective is on page 15)
• Dont forget the Intellectual Merit and Broader
  Impact statements

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What We Want to Know

• What is your research objective?
• This is what directs your proposal to the
  appropriate program
• What is your approach?
• Outline just two or three sentences
• What is the specific research contribution you
  will make to the knowledge base (the intellectual
  merit)?
• If successful, what will be the benefit to
  society (the broader impact)?

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Remember

• Your proposal will be returned without review if,
  in your Summary
• You fail to include explicit statements of
  intellectual merit and broader impact (entitle
  them Intellectual Merit, Broader Impact)
• The font is too small
• The margins are too narrow
• Or if you have an unauthorized attachment
• We have been lenient in the past, we will not be
  permitted such lenience in the future

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The Rest of Your Proposal

• The next 15 pages of your proposal give backup
  and detail to your summary
• Start with a restatement of your research
  objective, clarify it, and provide a research
  plan to accomplish it
• Restate and provide detail on your intellectual
  merit and broader impact

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Tips on Proposal Writing

• Use only 12 point type
• Do not use figures or tables as fillereverything
  should contribute
• Everything should be legibledo not use 2 point
  type on figures or tables
• Be sure to explain exactly what is your
  contribution to the knowledge base
• Use only the required format
• Be sure to include intellectual merit and broader
  impact statements in the body of the proposal

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Tips on Proposal Writing

• Dont include letters of collaboration if
• They arent very collaborative
• Several letters are identical
• They are letters from previous proposals
• You dont have them before the submission
  deadline
• Dont cut and paste together new proposals from
  old declined proposals
• Proofread your proposal before you submit it,
  including the references

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Intellectual Merit and Broader Impact Statements
NSF Design, Service and Manufacturing Grantees
and Research Conference
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IM and BI Statements

• They are required
• Your proposal will be rated based on them
• But
• What are they?
• What should you include?
• How should they shape your proposal?

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Intellectual Merit

• The Intellectual Merit is the contribution that
  your research makes to the knowledge base
• Questions
• What is already known?
• What is new?
• What will your research add?
• What will this do to enhance or enable research
  in your or other fields?

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Broader Impact

• The Broader Impact focuses on the benefit to
  society at large as a result of your research
  result
• Means to benefit society include
• Economic/environment/energy
• Education and training
• Providing opportunities for underrepresented
  groups
• Improving research and education infrastructure

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Example
The research goal of the proposed effort is to
gain sufficient understanding of the dynamic
forces during high speed cutting of titanium to
permit accurate prediction of chatter.
Measurements of dynamic forces will... If
successful, this work will lead to a theory
of... Intellectual merit The current
state-of-knowledge regarding the high-speed
machining of titanium is lacking in... The
proposed effort will contribute to the knowledge
of... This will enable further progress
through... Broader impact Titanium is finding
new uses in applications such as... Improved
knowledge of titanium machining will lead to more
efficient production of these parts, thus leading
to lower cost and more widespread use. Society
will benefit through... In addition, infusion of
the research results into the classroom will
better prepare graduates for work in...
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Education

• Undergraduate
• Curriculum
• Projects
• Graduate
• Curriculum
• Conferences
• Involvement with industry, national labs
• Network, partnership
• K-12
• Museum projects
• Should not be a boiler plate, pick and choose

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Caution

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Getting Involved
NSF Design, Service and Manufacturing Grantees
and Research Conference
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Be A Reviewer

• Proposal review is an important service to your
  community
• Theres no better way to see how the system works
• Theres no better way to understand what makes a
  winning proposal
• If you think the system is unfair, try being part
  of it

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How to Volunteer

• Contact your program director
• E-mail a brief (1-page) bio to your program
  director
• Be sure to include your contact information
• Indicate your areas of expertise

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Questions

• Its always better to ask before you submit a
  proposal than after you get the reviews
• Remember, were from the government, and were
  here to help