The Two Faces of Collaboration: Impacts of University-Industry Relations on Public Research

We analyze the impact of university-industry relationships on public research. Our inductive study of university-industry collaboration in engineering suggests that basic projects are more likely to yield academically valuable knowledge than applied projects. However, applied projects show higher degrees of partner interdependence and therefore enable exploratory learning by academics, leading to new ideas and projects. This result holds especially for research-oriented academics working in the ‘sciences of the artificial’ and engaging in multiple relationships with industry. Our learning-centred interpretation qualifies the notion of entrepreneurial science as a driver of applied university-industry collaboration. We conclude with implications for science and technology policy.University industry relations; Collaborative research; Contract research; Academic consulting; Science technology links; Engineering

Building bridges between industry and academia: what is the profile of an industrial doctorate student?

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Academic culture in doctoral education: are companies making a difference in the experiences and practices of doctoral students in Portugal?

Aim/Purpose: This article examines the experience and practice of doctoral students by focus-ing on different dimensions of the PhD socialization process. It addresses the question of whether university collaborations with businesses influence the ex-perience and practice of PhD students. Background: The study explores the academic culture in the PhD process through the analy-sis of the experiences and practices of doctoral students in two groups - those without business collaborations (academic trajectories) and those with business collaborations (hybrid trajectories). Academic trajectories are seen as traditional academic disciplinary based doctoral education, while hybrid trajectories cross boundaries collaborating with companies in the production of new knowledge.Methodology: The article uses a qualitative methodology based on extensive interviews and analysis of the curriculum vitae of fourteen Portuguese PhD students in three scientific domains (engineering and technology sciences, exact sciences, and so-cial sciences). The doctoral program profiles were defined according to a survey applied to the directors of all doctoral programs in Portugal. Contribution: The study contributes to the reflection on the effects of collaboration with companies, in particular on the trajectories and experiences of doctoral stu-dents. It contributes to the understanding of the challenges associated with business collaborations.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Scientists' engagement in knowledge transfer and exchange: Individual factors, variety of mechanisms and users

[EN] This article aims to provide a deeper understanding of the individual factors behind scientists' involvement in a wide variety of knowledge transfer and exchange (KTE) activities. By doing so, the article addresses three major shortcomings in the literature. First, this article considers scientists' involvement in both formal and informal KTE activities. Secondly, the study focuses not only on KTE activities with the private sector, but also with other types of agents. Thirdly, the article adopts an individual approach to distinguish between three types of KTE predictors: individual capacities, training and career trajectories, and motivations. Overall, the results of the regression model applied to a sample of 1,295 researchers active in the largest public research organization in Spain (CSIC) suggest that, while some individual features are connected to some KTE activities, other individual predictors (e.g. multitasking and interdisciplinarity) are more evenly associated to a variety of KTE mechanisms and users. Based on those findings, the article offers policy recommendations to craft more accurate policies to encourage scientists' KTE engagement.The empirical activity of this work was supported by the Spanish Council for Scientific Research (CSIC) through the IMPACTO project [Ref. 200410E639]; the authors acknowledge CSIC and other IMPACTO project researchers (INGENIO and IESA) for their work and the CSIC researchers whose answers to the questionnaire enabled us to develop the database. The authors acknowledge the financial support received from the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (Ref. CS02013-48053-R). The views expressed here are those of the authors and in no circumstance should be regarded as representing the official position of the European Commission.Llopis, O.; Sánchez-Barrioluengo, M.; Olmos-Peñuela, J.; Castro-Martínez, E. (2018). Scientists' engagement in knowledge transfer and exchange: Individual factors, variety of mechanisms and users. Science and Public Policy. 45(6):790-803. https://doi.org/10.1093/scipol/scy020S79080345

Novice facilitators as creative catalysts in innovation support

This article explores the value that students, acting as novice facilitators, bring in supporting professionals to innovate. This empirical research took a grounded theory and action research influenced approach to investigate a series of innovation support workshops with sole traders and SMEs delivered by Northumbria University. These workshops were part of a wider regional research project entitled Creative Fuse North East. The research found that there was trust and rapport between the expert facilitators, novice facilitators and enterprises participating which supported co-creation. In this safe environment, novice facilitators and enterprises worked together to learn and grow. It is argued that this enabled both parties to build their creative confidence. Thus, this approach offers a route to stimulating innovation in the region through supporting small scale enterprises and sole traders, and by developing strong creative graduates to participate in future workforces

Trialing project-based learning in a new EAP ESP course: A collaborative reflective practice of three college English teachers

Currently in many Chinese universities, the traditional College English course is facing the risk of being ‘marginalized’, replaced or even removed, and many hours previously allocated to the course are now being taken by EAP or ESP. At X University in northern China, a curriculum reform as such is taking place, as a result of which a new course has been created called ‘xue ke’ English. Despite the fact that ‘xue ke’ means subject literally, the course designer has made it clear that subject content is not the target, nor is the course the same as EAP or ESP. This curriculum initiative, while possibly having been justified with a rationale of some kind (e.g. to meet with changing social and/or academic needs of students and/or institutions), this is posing a great challenge for, as well as considerable pressure on, a number of College English teachers who have taught this single course for almost their entire teaching career. In such a context, three teachers formed a peer support group in Semester One this year, to work collaboratively co-tackling the challenge, and they chose Project-Based Learning (PBL) for the new course. This presentation will report on the implementation of this project, including the overall designing, operational procedure, and the teachers’ reflections. Based on discussion, pre-agreement was reached on the purpose and manner of collaboration as offering peer support for more effective teaching and learning and fulfilling and pleasant professional development. A WeChat group was set up as the chief platform for messaging, idea-sharing, and resource-exchanging. Physical meetings were supplementary, with sound agenda but flexible time, and venues. Mosoteach cloud class (lan mo yun ban ke) was established as a tool for virtual learning, employed both in and after class. Discussions were held at the beginning of the semester which determined only brief outlines for PBL implementation and allowed space for everyone to autonomously explore in their own way. Constant further discussions followed, which generated a great deal of opportunities for peer learning and lesson plan modifications. A reflective journal, in a greater or lesser detailed manner, was also kept by each teacher to record the journey of the collaboration. At the end of the semester, it was commonly recognized that, although challenges existed, the collaboration was overall a success and they were all willing to continue with it and endeavor to refine it to be a more professional and productive approach

Researcher Mobility Workshop Report: Researcher mobility among APEC economies

There is growing acknowledgement around the world that contemporary research is increasingly – and needs to be – international. In a globalised world common problems can only be solved through the sharing of expertise and pooling of resources. At the same time, research developments are critical in stimulating economic growth in knowledge economies. Ensuring that researchers can access best practice through international research collaboration is essential in facilitating innovation. Policies and structures can go a long way to supporting increased international research collaboration. Online communication technologies have become a vital part of researcher mobility, enabling researchers to unite in conducting collaborative research across the world. It is inevitable that policy makers may regard communication developments as taking the place of physical researcher mobility and hence reducing the cost involved. Research indicates, however, that face-to-face interaction remains vital in successful research collaborations, particularly at the early stage of projects and when multi-disciplinary approaches are required1. This is due to the role of face-to-face interaction in creating trust between researchers. Thus, international research collaborations are fundamentally premised on researcher mobility and, hence, researcher mobility lies at the core of efforts to enhance the quality, impact and capacity of research to inform innovation in all APEC economies. This report has been written for the APEC Researcher Mobility Workshop, held in Jakarta in December 2015. Chapters 1 to 7 were prepared to stimulate consideration of the issues surrounding researcher mobility. They provide an overview of pertinent literature, case studies, data sets and policy of relevance to the topics that were discussed at the workshop. Chapter 8 provides a report on discussions at the workshop and identifies recommendations made by workshop participants

Opportunities and challenges: european PhD students researching citizenship

This article describes ongoing work from within Children’s Identity and Citizenship in Europe (CiCe) a European Thematic Network project (see Alistair Ross in this issue). The Research Student Strand of that network is made up of a group of colleagues (including the authors of this article) who are co-operating to provide guidance for PhD research students and their supervisors. We report here on a small-scale project designed to explore debates about the nature of work being undertaken by PhD students who have interests in citizenship. In particular we wished to discuss the extent to which these students as researchers exercise freedom or are constrained. Following some contextual remarks about PhD research in Europe and the work of CiCe we describe the small scale research project and suggest that there are significant and, perhaps, increasing constraints that affect the work of students as they seek to create new knowledge. In essence we ask how we may guarantee the achievement of valuable new work if in effect we impose more common practice in line with market reforms and heightened quality assurance mechanisms. While recognising the need for appropriate standards we suggest that we need to exercise caution if we are to avoid the PhD becoming a constrained and constraining training exercise for those who are to be accepted into existing academic debates and established academic communities