SSTI Digest

Last week, David Allen began his tenure as Assistant Vice President for Technology Transfer at the University of Colorado. Allen was the Assistant Vice President for Technology Partnerships at the Ohio State University.

Lu Cordova is the new President of the Colorado Technology Incubator.

Colorado The Governor’s Office of Innovation and Technology and the state’s Science and Technology Commission have teamed up to create the Colorado Technology Alliance to provide tech business recruitment information and assistance. According to a recent Pueblo Chieftain article, the Alliance will prepare a clearinghouse website and a 120-page resource magazine. Local and regional information for the website will be administered and maintained by local tech-based economic development officials. Covington, Kentucky The Cincinnati Enquirer reports the Madison Avenue Launch Team, a Covington non-profit organization, has signed a five-year lease to create a 21,000 sq. ft. technology accelerator to provide office space for up to 12 firms, mentoring services, and business assistance. So far, $200,000 in funding for the accelerator has been secured from the city of Covington, the Tricounty Economic Development Corp., and private investors. Additional funding is sought from the Kentucky Innovations Commission. More information about the accelerator and…

Colorado The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is donating $8 million over five years to support the creation of four “high tech” high schools around the state. Modeled after San Diego’s High Tech High, the Colorado schools will have teacher-to-student ratios of 1:15 and the same teacher will work with the students for four years. Students would have individualized workstations and practical internship experience will be built into the curriculum. The state is providing an $8 million match for the grant. Marc Holtzman, the Governor’s Secretary for Technology, is chairing the effort. The Gates grant will also support the creation of a charter school network and breaking three large public schools into smaller multiplex schools managed by a private organization. For more information, see: http://www.gatesfoundation.org/ Michigan To entice technology cluster development, the Michigan Economic Development Corp (MEDC) has announced the creation of 11 SmartZones, areas with existing clusters of high-tech companies, universities, and research institutions…

Colorado leaders want to encourage more college students to go into science and teaching and two recent proposals, coming from Governor Bill Owens and the state's Commission on Higher Education, are designed to do just that. In Owens' proposed FY 2002 budget for education, announced on Dec. 6, $51.3 million will be allotted in teacher pay incentives to allow principals to reward outstanding teaching, to offer recruitment bonuses to encourage Colorado's best teachers to serve in schools with unsatisfactory academic performance, and to offer recruitment and retention bonuses in hard-to-recruit subjects including math, science and special education. Also, the Commission on Higher Education has proposed $2,000 in loan forgiveness per year to those college students who choose to teach in science, math, and special education. Students would be eligible for three years of debt relief, up to $6,000 total. For a position to be classified as difficult to fill, it must have had fewer than five applicants. According to Jeanne Adkins, Director of policy and planning for the Commission, the new…

The 18 governors who comprise the Western Governors’ Association (WGA) have agreed to create a Western High Technology Council to serve as a strategic alliance among states, technology firms and universities to advance the region's common interests in the technology-driven and knowledge-based New Economy. Hawaii Governor Ben Cayetano, WGA Chairman, proposed the idea at the WGA winter meeting held in Las Vegas during December. The governors asked Intel, Silicon Graphics, and other interested companies to work with university partners and WGA staff to develop a business plan for the proposed council. A concept paper prepared for the governors' discussion suggested the Council's membership initially include 15 to 20 high-level representatives from information, health, and biotechnology industries and leaders from academia and the public sector. The paper also suggests that the council form broad-based work groups comprised of stakeholders and academia to develop recommendations on specific issues. Any council recommendations developed in the next six months…

Colorado Governor Bill Owen has appointed 55 technology executives and public officials to serve on the Governor’s Commission on Science and Technology. The Commission’s purpose is to issue a set of recommendations by late-2000 focused on enhancing Colorado's business climate and creating the technological infrastructure necessary to foster statewide growth of the high technology industry. Specifically, the group is tasked to: review Colorado's current tax, regulatory, and Internet policies and offer the Governor a set of recommendations to pursue as a basis for developing state-level governmental policies. assess Colorado's ability to benefit from national and global growth opportunities presented by the explosion in information technology, and to make recommendations designed to leverage public investment by creating more opportunities and incentives to foster the location and growth of high technology businesses throughout the state address the shortage of a qualified high technology workforce and to make recommendations on what industry, educators, and government can do to…

The Colorado Advanced Technology Institute (CATI) has been abolished effective June 30, 1999. CATI was the state's lead organization on technology-based economic development since its creation in 1983. Responsibility for CATI programs is being transferred to the Colorado Commission on Higher Education. CATI funds appropriated for FY2000 will be split between the Colorado Commission on Higher Education (CCHE) and the recently created Office of Innovation and Technology in the Governor's office, which is expected to focus on communications and information resources within state government. CATI staff have either accepted new positions with CCHE or other organizations or retired.

Dr. Phillips Bradford the Executive Director of the Colorado Advanced Technology Institute has resigned his position. Lenie Roos-Gabridge has been appointed Interim Chief Operating Officer. Bradford’s resignation is the latest in an unprecedented turnover of state technology-based economic development officials. In the last year alone, the leaders of 14 states’ technology efforts have left their positions. Other recent departures include those of:  Dr. Diana Weigmann, director of the Nevada Governor’s Office of Science, Education and Technology; and, Dr. Carolyn Sales, the long-time president of the Oklahoma Center for the Advancement of Science and Technology (OCAST).  Dr. Sales was also a member of the SSTI Board of Trustees; her place on the SSTI Board has been filled by Del Schuh, president of the Indiana Business Modernization and Technology Corp.

The Technology Transfer Society presented its 1996 Justin Morrill Award to the Colorado Advanced Technology Institute (CATI). The Justin Morrill Award is presented to organizations that have an exemplary record in technology transfer and have made outstanding contributions to technology transfer theory and practice. CATI was recognized "for its wide array of activities that demonstrate what can be done by a state agency to promote and support effective technology transfer by providing resources, leadership, consultation and cooperation." The Technology Transfer Society is a professional society whose members set policy, develop partnerships and support research and development on methods and tools in the technology transfer field.