The Mathematical Sciences: A Report (1968) / Chapter Skim
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10 Federal Support of Research
10 Federal Support of Research
Pages 163-178
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From page 163... ...
LEVEL AND SOURCES OF SUPPORT The principal government-wide analysis of federal research obligations is contained in the National Science Foundation series, Federal Funds for Research, Development, and Other Scientific Activities.2 The figures below were obtained from Volumes IV-XV of this series. As Table 12 shows, eight agencies are currently the key federal contributors to support of research, both basic and applied, in the mathematical sciences.
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From page 164... ...
Examples of basic research in applied mathematics are studies in the mathematical theory of linguistics, dynamical systems and their astronomical applications, and the theory of rotating fluids for the understanding of geophysical phenomena. The amounts shown in Table 19 are for the support of both basic and applied research.
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From page 165... ...
When it comes to interpreting the dollar amounts in Table 13, it must be kept ire mind that they neither coincide with nor entirely include the totals allocated for mathematical research to universities. In the budgets of the military services, about 85 percent of the amount allocated to basic mathematical research is spent in universities.
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From page 166... ...
A comparable amount is probably distributed in the laboratories of the Navy, and somewhat less in the Air Force. Once the contributions of NIH and NASA have been added to these items and combined with the mathematical research funds obligated by
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From page 167... ...
A great deal of credit for the rise of the United States, during the 1950's, to a position of world pre-eminence in mathematical research is due to the vision and policies of mission-oriented agencies within the federal government, and above all those of the Department of Defense. In fact, in the critical period immediately following World War II it was a newly formed mission-oriented agencythe Once of Naval Research that pioneered in developing contract machinery appropriate for federal support of scientific research in universities.
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From page 168... ...
Joint meetings, problem workshops, and special program activities aimed at "coupling" are all being tried, in part to get the word out and in part to create opportunities for outstanding mathematicians to influence, when and as they may choose, the extension of mathematical modes of thinking in areas of science and technology currently of national concern. We note that support of basic research by agencies with specific applied missions results in multiple sources of support, a condition
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From page 169... ...
to engage in support of basic mathematical research in areas closely related to their missions; and, indeed, Table 14 indicates that this support has grown at an average annual rate of approximately 15 percent during the period 19601966. During the same period, however, a computation using figures from Tables 12 and 13 shows that support of applied mathematical research by the mission-oriented agencies has grown at an average annual rate of over 50 percent.
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From page 170... ...
Finally, we emphasize once more that in the future comparable recommendations may be expected to apply not only to the mission-oriented agencies of Table 12 but also to federal agencies concerned with such matters as urban development, education, environmental pollution, and natural resources. FORMS OF SUPPORT This Committee is aware that authoritative voices have proposed very radical changes in the whole federal system for supporting academic research and university education, abandoning the present forms of support in favor of direct federal subsidies to universities.
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From page 171... ...
A point that deserves emphasis is the relative inexpensiveness of "project support per tenure research grantee" for the mathematical sciences as compared with the physical sciences. The primary Sensors for this is, of course, easily understood: project grants in the mathematical sciences, even as recently as 1966, involved little in the way of computer or other equipment costs, whereas equipment costs for the physical sciences in the recent years have ranged from relatively modest, as in the case of chemistry and solid-state physics, to ex
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From page 172... ...
While there was a fair spread in the results, the average was very close to this $22,000 figure, and the spread was considerably less than where both junior researchers and tenure researchers were taken into account. We therefore suggest that "project support per tenure research investigator" is a reasonably stable figure to use in projecting grant support on a demographic basis.
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From page 173... ...
To help offset these disadvantages we suggest that evaluating panels should include representatives of new areas of mathematical research (in both core mathematics and applied fields) , that younger investigators not at leading universities should be included in the projects of senior people at such universities, and that the projects should provide for travel funds adequate to maintain contact between the senior mathematicians and such younger men.
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From page 174... ...
In total, the mathematicalscience parts of these 10 grants amounted to some $4.7 million, the major portion of it awarded within fiscal 1966. In the fall of 1966s the Science Development Program was broadened to include, in addition to the original University Science Development Program, a Departmental Science Development Program at the graduate level and a College Science Improvement Program for primarily undergraduate institutions.
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From page 175... ...
On the other hand, in the cases of two institutions, the awarding of strongly interdisciplinary grants led to considerable friction between the mathematics department and the other departments involved, and the outcome was on the whole detrimental to the development of mathematics in these institutions. For this reason especially, we welcome the broadening of the NSF Science Development Program to include a departmental program and feel that the added flexibility thus introduced will prove particularly valuable to departments of mathematics.
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From page 176... ...
Advantage should be taken of improved socio-economic conditions when these are present. The NSF Science Development Program has sometimes been described as aimed at creating "new centers of excellence." As far as departments of mathematics are concerned, this program has in practice aimed mainly at raising them to the "strong" level, rather than the "distinguished" one, in the rating of Cartter's study,32 page 66.
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From page 177... ...
TIME AND EFFORT REPORTING Prominent members of the mathematics community have expressed strong concern to us arid to the Division of Mathematical Sciences of the National Research Council about the unreasonableness and the dangers of recent requirements of faculty "time and effort reportirlg" in connection with university cost-sharing on project grants. We realize that this is a matter affecting the entire scientific community and not just mathematicians; however, research in the mathematical sciences differs, in its independence of place and tools, from research in other sciences.
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From page 178... ...
We therefore urge that federal fiscal offices and university business officers work with the academic research community to develop accounting requirements, appropriate to each individual university and discipline, that will provide proper information in a way that will preserve the integrity of the scientific community. We also note the following resolution passed by the Council of the American Mathematical Society meeting in Toronto on August 29, 1967: The Council of the American Mathematical Society urges responsible university officers to take immediate action to have Time and Effort Reports and similar documents pertaining to faculty members' time eliminated, because it considers that such documents are incompatible with academic life and work.
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