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aaac:may26

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Agenda May 26, 2015

Work Plan

  1. Use the data already collected and mine it for some more specific questions and data-driven scenarios
    • Ted and Keivan present extensions to models of “time until proposal exhaustion”
    • What is an institutional review board and why do we need it?
  2. Determine what information didn't make it into the original survey and incorporate it in the new one.
    • Go over questions below. Create small group to prepare new survey and report to larger group.
  3. Gather a larger data set and cover more agencies for the conditional and correlated information.
    • Create subgroup to follow through on this. Agency liaison model. Report back to whole group.

Additional Information and references

Sample questions that go beyond the Von Hippel Survey

= Important note: This list is far too long and we would clearly need to reduce the number of questions, The ones listed are just examples =

Answer these questions with a scale: strongly agree <--> neutral <--> strongly disagree)
  • How would the following actions by the funding agencies affect you?
    • Limiting applicants to one PI or CoI proposal per year:
      • would increase the time I could spend on my research
      • would reduce my chances for tenure.
      • would cause me to leave the field.
      • would reduce the number of proposals I submit.
      • would improve the quality of those proposals I submit
      • would reduce the size of my research group
    • Calling for proposals every other year
      • Etc..
    • Introducing a pre-proposal stage.
      • Etc…
    • Reducing the amount of funding for individual proposals
      • Etc..
    • Creating smaller research grants for exploratory research, with an expectation that successful proposals are likely to be funded in the following year
  • Proposals to non-governmental research funds are easier to get funded (or “are available to me” )
  • There are too many scientists in the field of astrophysics and the low success rate is an appropriate method of population control
Other questions
  • If my proposal is rejected, (choose one answer that best represents your action)
    • I resubmit the same proposal the next year
    • I submit a different type of proposal the next year
    • I support my research on someone else's grant
    • I submit a similar proposal to a different federal funding source
    • I submit a similar proposal to a private funding source
    • I concentrate on other aspects of my job (e.g. teaching)

Sharpen arguments from the Agency statistics.

= The Longer report on Proposal Pressures that was not in finished form by the March 2015 AAAC report, may be a good place to start. What are the questions not yet answered, what additional information is required to make a case.=

Further analysis of the proposal per year and proposal per 3 year NSF data
A few more snapshots of the NASA Astrophysics merit criteria.
Explore further effect of pre-proposal strategy on those that have tried it
Detailed comparison of DOE Cosmic Frontier model vs NSF, NASA wrt results. diAny lessons to be learned?
Better data on cost per proposal and number of PI's on proposals, etc
aaac/may26.1432579734.txt.gz · Last modified: 2015/05/25 13:48 by prisca