This second conference is a follow up to the first one conducted last October, 2016, (Please see this website for details of the first conference). The aim of the first conference and also the aim of this second one  is  to provide Associate Deans of engineering from smaller, primarily public, institutions with the practical, effective and field-based knowledge they need to successfully address some of the following challenges to the development of research and graduate education at smaller universities.

a) Helping faculty to be successful, i.e. getting more funding and national recognition
b) Assisting junior faculty, especially during their pre-tenure years, through mentoring, particularly for highly prestigious and competitive grants such as the NSF CAREER awards and its equivalent awards from other agencies (e.g. Air Force Young Investigator Award)
c) Providing faculty the necessary infrastructure for writing proposals for large funding amounts
d) Facilitating both disciplinary and interdisciplinary collaborative groups or clusters
e) Increasing research productivity as well as enhancing the impact of the research
f) Cultivating research leaders who might be PIs on future large proposals
g) Defining and empowering the position of Associate Dean of Research in a consistent way
h) Providing Associate Deans of Research a system of metrics both for self-evaluation and for evaluation of their Colleges/Schools of Engineering
i) Recruiting best quality graduate students especially domestic students, possibly from one another’s institutions
j) Recruiting women faculty and faculty from underrepresented minority groups
k) Developing inter-institutional collaborations since smaller sized schools do not have the critical mass necessary for having the program managers, proposal managers, research assistantships needed to put together large funding proposals especially for Institutes or Centers
l) Optimizing Associate Deans relationships with their Deans
m) Optimizing Associate Deans relationships with their engineering faculty colleagues.

More details about the specific agenda will follow.

There is no fee to attend.

Some modest travel support will be available.

Local hotels for consideration are Crown Plaza, 733 West Madison • Chicago, Illinois 60661, 312-829 -5000; and the Chicago Marriott At Medical District/UIC, 625 S. Ashland Ave. at Harrison St., 60607, 312 491 1234.  Hotels in downtown Chicago are easily within a cab ride distance.

Please feel free to alert other Associate Deans of Research from small or mid-sized schools (150 Faculty members or less) about the Conference.

This workshop is supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation, CBET #1646808.

Please RSVP to me at Kenbrez@uic.edu as soon as possible so I can estimate the number of attendees.