Norman Campus Research

1. Norman Campus Research Kelvin K. Droegemeier Vice President for Research

2. Norman Campus • Approximately 1300 research faculty • 21,154 undergraduate students • 2,400 MS students, 1,400 doctoral students • 16 colleges • More than 60 academic departments • More than 70 centers/institutes (8 University Strategic Organizations) • Five surveys (Bio, Geo, Climate, Archeology, Water) • Two field stations (Biological, Atmospheric/Ecological) • The Research Campus • Architecture • Arts and Sciences • Atmospheric and Geographic Sciences • Business • Continuing Education • Earth and Energy • Education • Engineering • Fine Arts • Graduate • Honors • International Studies • Journalism • Law • Liberal Studies • University College

3. Research Mission and Vision • Research Mission: To utilize the intellectual, technological, and administrative resources of the University of Oklahoma for the generation and dissemination of new knowledge to understand and improve all aspects of life and living. • Research Vision: To become the Nation’s foremost public comprehensive research university of our size.

4. Research Values • The University's most treasured assets are its students, faculty & staff and their dreams, ambitions and talents. • All disciplines of scholarly endeavor are valued contributors to research and creative activity. • Integrity, ethical conduct, and mutual respect are uncompromising principles by which research and creative activity must be pursued. • Unfettered exchange and debate of competing ideas and perspectives expands understanding, promotes inclusion and ultimately leads to excellence. • Collaboration – whether among individuals in the same discipline or involving scholars across multiple disciplines, programs, institutions, and types of organizations – is recognized as a valuable means for performing research and creative activity and is encouraged.  • Research and education are inextricably intertwined and together represent the foundation of knowledge creation upon which the University's scholarly enterprise rests.

5. My Role as VP for Research • Assist faculty across all disciplines within a comprehensive research university in achieving their scholarly goals and dreams • Help locate and create opportunity • Help build collaborations internally and externally • Help define research program trajectories and prepare competitive proposals • Provide financial and other resources • Create incentives and rewards • Promulgate useful policies and reduce administrative burden • Ensure tight integration of instruction and research • Shine a bright light on achievement • Recruit and retain the best faculty and students – to continue the cycle

6. What’s Not in the VPR Area • Compliance (Legal Counsel) • Human Research Protections/IRB • IACUC • HIPAA • Environmental Health and Safety • Radiation and Laboratory Safety • Export Controls (Legal Counsel) • Economic Development and Technology Transfer (VP for Strategic Planning and Economic Development) • Research Communications (Research Cabinet, Public Affairs) • Graduate Programs (Dean of the Graduate College)

7. University Scholarship

8. Scientific & Engineering Strengths • Radar and Remote Sensing • Weather/Water/Climate • Integrative Social Sciences • K20 STEM Education • X-omics/Integrative Life Sciences • Unmanned Systems • Fungible Biofuels • Cognitive Psychology/Deception • Biomedical Engineering andAdvanced Medical Imaging • Early Childhood Education • Thin Film Electronic Devices • Single-Walled Carbon Nanotubes • Environmental Sustainability • Health and the Environment • Risk and Crisis Management • Natural Products Chemistry • High Energy Physics

9. Non-Science & Engineering Strengths • History of Science • Religious Studies • International Relations • Modern Dance • Rhetoric • Marketing • Classics • US Constitution • Art History • Film and Media Studies

10. Centers, Institutes, Consortia, Surveys • Some 80 centers and institutes on the Norman Campus across all disciplines • Carl Albert Center • Center for the Study of Constitutional Heritage • Carbon Nanotube Technology Center • National Center for Disability Education and Training • Others… • Five surveys • Water, Climate, Biological, Archeological, Geological • Several consortia • Rock Mechanics, NASA Space Grant, Student Retention Data Exchange, Coiled Tubing Mechanics, Applied Surfactant Research, others…

11. University Strategic Organizations • Chosen competitively – flagship efforts core to institutional priorities and strengths • VPR Office provides $150K/year for five years (renewable) to underpin soft funding • High degree of accountability; high expectations • Current USOs • Advanced Radar Research Center • Center for Analysis and Prediction of Storms (graduated NSF S&T Center) • Center for Applied Social Research • Institute for Early Childhood Education (OU-Tulsa) • K20 Center for Education and Community Renewal • OU Biomedical Engineering Center • South-Central Region Climate Science Center • Cooperative Institute for Mesoscale Meteorological Studies

12. Strategic Research Initiatives • Areas where current success suggests ability to move to international prominence • Faculty self-identify and develop compelling strategic plan across disciplines, colleges, departments • OU evaluates and provides open hunting license for faculty – go get the best • Cross-cutting advocacy – traditional boundaries no longer relevant

13. Strategic Research Initiatives • Since 2003 • 32 hires (some new lines, some re-directs) • $9.5M invested ($2M annual cost) • $34M new expenditures • $9M new indirect costs recovered

14. Value of Strategic Investment

15. How OU Compares

16. How OU Plans • Data-driven approach initiated in spring, 2010 • Goal was not to develop a plan, but a shared view build upon foundational principles and objectives • Key questions asked • Where are we today? • Why are we where we’re at? • Where do we want to go? • What actions need to be taken to get us there? • Full engagement of faculty via Action Teams • Topics addressed to date: Incentives and Rewards, Cross-Cutting Themes, Arts and Humanities, Undergraduate Research, Graduate Research, Education Research

17. One Set Many Analyses

18. What did we learn about ourselves? That OU has considerable unrealized potential and must • Think bigger • Raise expectations and accountability • Improve rewards and motivate risk-taking • Seek more national centers and large projects • Increase engagement with certain Federal agencies • Submit higher quality, more competitive proposals overall • Develop more effective ways of investing in research • Establish an additional Federal presence in Norman • Develop new support infrastructures and contracting vehicles • Engage more effectively with industry • Be more active in driving the national research agenda

19. Competitiveness – The ability for OU to compete more effectively in the national and international marketplace of ideas, people and resources. • Engagement – The ability for OU to engage across its programs, and with other organizations, aligning interests, building relationships, establishing mechanisms for pursuing new activities, and communicating OU’s strengths and capabilities to multiple sectors. • Culture – An inspiring environment and institutional personality that incentivizes and rewards creativity and bold, transformative thinking, and that maintains accountability with the highest standards of excellence in all scholarly endeavors. Transforming Research Engagement Transforming Research Competitiveness Nation’s Foremost Public Comprehensive Research University Of Our Size Transforming Research Culture

20. Actions Taken During Past Two Years • Created Center for Research Program Development & Enrichment(CRPDE) • Created Faculty Challenge Grant Program (seed funding up to $100K/project) • Created a Strategic Initiative in Defense/Security/Intelligence (DSI) • Created Center for Applied R&D (CARD) • Launched a Centers Initiativeto garner more nationally competitive centers • Created Research Liaison Program • Re-competed the University Strategic Organizations • Created a VPR Faculty Awards Program • Created a Recognition Program for Exceptional Achievement in Research & CA • Overhauled the Research Council Funding Portfolio • Established a Norman Campus Undergraduate Research Coordinator • Began creating a Faculty Leadership Academy • Began work on a Broadening Participation Initiative • Began effort to improve Collaborative Environment • Began University-wide Effort to Nominate Faculty for Prestigious National Awards

21. Actions Taken During Past Two Years • Hired Cluster of four new faculty in Electrical and Computer Engineering as part of the Strategic Initiatives in Radar and DSI Research • Building a new Radar Innovations Center • Built a $3.2 million Devon Hall clean room • Created a program to assist colleges and departments in preparing nominations for prestigious national and international awards • Stronger interactions with the OU Health Science Center • Biomedical Engineering (nano-medicine, prosthetics) • Advanced cancer imaging • Health disparities/environmental impacts on health

22. Priority Areas Going Forward & Centers Initiative • Radar and Remote Sensing • Weather, Water and Climate • Unmanned Systems • Renewable Energy/Biofuels • Environmental Sustainability • Materials Science (includes nanoscience and nanotechnology) • Risk and Crisis Management • Biomedical Engineering • Integrative Social Sciences • Natural Products Chemistry • Advanced Medical Imaging • Degraded DNA and Metagenomics • Business and Financial Dimensions of Energy

23. VPR Monetary Support of Research • Annual VPR Budget = IDC recovered in grant/contract expenditures • New Faculty Start-Up • Sponsored Research Incentive (IDC return, 18% to unit, 2% to deans) • Applied Program Support (25% to PI, 20% to Dean, 10% to Home Unit, 5% to Administering unit) • Research Council Programs (Faculty Investment Program, Junior Faculty Fellowships) • VPR Direct Programs (Faculty Travel Support Program, Publication Support Program, Arts and Humanities Program) • Faculty Challenge Grant Program ($650K in 2011) • Potentially Transformative Research Program ($100K in 2010) • Faculty Retention • Rent in Partners Place Buildings • Grant Proposal Cost Sharing • Equipment Purchase • Strategic Initiatives Faculty Salaries • Facilities Renovation • Core Laboratory Staff Salaries • Informal Requests/Emergency Needs

24. VPR Monetary Support of Research

25. Other VPR Support Services • Center for Research Program Development and Enrichment (CRPDE) • Office of Research Services (ORS) • Center for Applied R&D (CARD) • Office of Defense, Security and Intelligence (DSI) Programs • Planning and Operations (space, business plans, budgets) • Research Statistics and Analysis (RSA) • Undergraduate Research

26. Center for Research Program Development and Enrichment (CRPDE) • Works with faculty one-on-one, and in groups, to develop their scholarly programs • Supports the development of proposals, from individual investigator to center, from idea through completed narrative • Stimulates collaborative and interdisciplinary research • Supports student and post doctoral research development • Facilitates outreach, broadening of participation, and multi-institutional engagement • Aligns OU with national initiatives and special programs (e.g., CIF21, Big Data, STEM Ed, I-CORPS, INSPIRE, SBIR/STTR, EPSCoR)

27. Strategic Initiative in Defense, Security and Intelligence (DSl) Research • Goal is to increase substantially OU’s success in basic research, applied development, consulting and training in areas for which we traditionally have not been a significant player, but for which considerable opportunity exists to help our nation • Strong push toward classified research (OU has the administrative machinery and space) • New resources have been directed toward helping faculty work with DSI agencies • Several wins: IARPA contract ($10.4M), SBIRs, USAF Sole Source contract, DARPA contract, MDA activities

28. Mission • To provide an administrative framework to increase substantially applied research and development, and related education and training, on the OU Norman Campus • Goals • Open new spaces of opportunity for researchers and students • Support business processes and personnel for applied research and development contracts that are not presently being pursued (e.g., GSA Schedules, ID/IQ) • Bring the intellectual capacity of OU to government and private industry through a new consulting framework • Augment traditional faculty capacity with a staff of full-time, professional, non-faculty researchers

29. Outcomes • Carnegie Very High Research classification • Record expenditures: $93.2 million in FY12, forecast $100 million in FY13 • Several MAJOR awards • Department of the Interior Regional Climate Science Center • NOAA Cooperative Institute ($75 million/5 years) renewal • K20 Center DoED GEAR-UP Grant ($27 million/7 years) • I-ARPAcontract ($10.7 million/5 years) • New NSF MRI grants ($2.8 million) • NIH COBRE grant – a first for the Norman Campus ($10.4 million/5 years)

30. Beyond the Dollars in FY11 • Numerous faculty outcomes and achievements and honors • Guggenheim • Fulbright • Articles in Nature, Science • Humboldt Foundation Award • Lew Hunter Award for Outstanding Screenplay Feature • Beverly Hills Film Festival Golden Palm Award for Best Screenplay • Numerous books, articles, conferences, performances, exhibits

31. Research and IT • VPR Office supports IT for research in a variety of ways • Cost sharing on equipment proposals (e.g., PetaStore) • Direct funding for equipment and renovation • Operation of special IT facilities • Proposal development – data management plans, HPC resource coordination, sharing of equipment • OU has/has had several IT/data-related research projects (see handout) • Hiring of new CIO and Dean of Libraries opens a host of opportunities for collaboration at the institutional leadership level • Little to “undo” in the way of historical inertia • Formulation of policies with broad view of the future (e.g., data plans) • Institutional repository for research data • Sharing of personnel, software and ideas  economies of scale (informatics) • CCEW Software Business Accelerator • Your insights and suggestions will be most valuable to us!

32. Challenges Going Forward • “These are the best of times, and challenging (but not the worst of) times” (David L. Boren) • Flat/declining Federal agency research budgets • Balancing existing obligations with new commitments • Expected faculty turnover in next several years (loss of grant-productive faculty, large start-up costs, ramp-up of research programs) • Cost of research infrastructure • Increasing number of unfunded compliance mandates (data management, COI, cost sharing, reporting, …) • Under-recovery of IDC on many Federal programs

33. Strategy • Continue investing strategically in strongest research programs • Grow other areas, especially those having synergy with them • Broaden and deepen engagement with industry • Continue recruiting outstanding talent – “Need a big pond to fish for marlin” • Be a comprehensive institution

34. Priorities • Broadening the Research Portfolio (Defense/Security/Intelligence Initiative) • Pursuing and Winning National Centers (Centers Initiative) • Thinking Bigger/Larger Projects (Challenge Grants, Incentive Program) • Collaboration with Federal Labs, Universities, Private Companies • Applied R&D (Center for Applied R&D; pursuit of a UARC) • Undergraduate Research Across the University • Continuing to build research programs with Health Science Center • Interdisciplinary Research and Collaborative Environments • Developing Faculty Leadership • Recruiting, Electing, and Nurturing National Academy Members • Nominating Outstanding Faculty for Prestigious National Awards • Initiative on BroadeningParticipation • Incentivizing & Rewarding Excellence in Scholarship Across all Disciplines