Partnerships for Broader Impacts Design

Partnerships for Broader Impacts Design

Partnerships for Broader Impacts Design

Overview of the BID Project
Broader Impacts work requires a wide range of knowledge, skills, and resources. Often, these assets are held by different individuals at different organizations. By connecting individuals and organizations that hold these various assets, we can increase capacity to do this work, and do it better.
The premise of the Broader Impacts Design (BID) project is that by establishing a partnership that is durable – that is to say, one that is built to last beyond any individual collaborative project or person in a specific leadership position – universities and informal science education organizations (ISEs) can increase their capacity to focus on the quality of the Broader Impacts (BI) projects, and can better align subsequent collaborative efforts with their own institutional priorities.
The goal is to establish durable, institutionalized partnerships that enable both organizations to more effectively support Principal Investigators in their Broader Impacts work.
The challenges associated with the traditional “ad hoc” approach are well documented. When collaborations are established at the level of the individual researcher, or Principal Investigator (PI), they often reach out to any informal learning expert whose contact info they can find – and often too late for effective planning. Particularly when planning is rushed, it can be difficult to make sure the resource needs and priorities of each partner are adequately addressed. Even when these efforts lead to funding, shared efforts often have an expiration date when the PI’s funding ends or their interest/position leads them elsewhere. The cycle repeats each time a new PI seeks ISE support for their own Broader Impacts work.
We hope that bringing organizations together at an institutional level can help reduce these redundancies and pave the way for higher impact collaborations.
What follows is an account of our experiences over the course of four years. This collection of resources is the product of many individuals, and depicts a work in progress. The project consisted of three core partnerships in New York, Washington, and Wisconsin. The experiences of these partners are outlined in detail here (below) and as timelines. Six additional partnerships (in California, Colorado, Minnesota, New Mexico, North Carolina, and Vermont/New Hampshire) joined the project as a second cohort; the experiences of these groups is described through short vignettes on the “Themes” page.
The BID project was supported by a collection of collaborative research grants funded by the National Foundation and awarded to the Institute for Learning Innovation, Oregon State University, Pacific Science Center, The University of Washington – Bothell, The University of Wisconsin – Madison, The Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery, Sciencenter in Ithaca, and Cornell University.
Washington State BID team:
University of Washington Bothell and Pacific Science Center
The WA BID partnership was an existing partnership between a primarily undergraduate institution and a non-profit science museum at the onset of this project.
New York State BID team:
Cornell University and Sciencenter
The NY BID partnership was a new (Emerging) partnership between an R1 research university and a small non-profit science museum at the onset of this project.
Wisconsin State BID team:
University of Wisconsin-Madison and Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery
The WI BID partnership was an existing partnership between an R1 research university and a public engagement with science program housed on the UW-Madison campus.
University Partner Overview:
University Partner Overview:
University Partner Overview:
ISE Partner Overview:
ISE Partner Overview:
ISE Partner Overview:
Special Partnership Characteristics and Considerations
Special Partnership Characteristics and Considerations
Special Partnership Characteristics and Considerations
Washington State BID team:
University of Washington Bothell and Pacific Science Center
The WA BID partnership was an existing partnership between a primarily undergraduate institution and a non-profit science museum at the onset of this project.
University Partner Overview:
ISE Partner Overview:
Special Partnership Characteristics and Considerations
New York State BID team:
Cornell University and Sciencenter
The NY BID partnership was a new (Emerging) partnership between an R1 research university and a small non-profit science museum at the onset of this project.
University Partner Overview:
ISE Partner Overview:
Special Partnership Characteristics and Considerations
Wisconsin State BID team:
University of Wisconsin-Madison and Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery
The Wisconsin BID partnership was an existing partnership between an R1 research university, University of Wisconsin-Madison and a Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation (WARF) public engagement with science program on the UW-Madison campus.
University Partner Overview:
ISE Partner Overview:
Special Partnership Characteristics and Considerations
Washington State BID team:
University of Washington Bothell and Pacific Science Center
The WA BID partnership was an existing partnership between a primarily undergraduate institution and a non-profit science museum at the onset of this project.
University Partner Overview:
ISE Partner Overview:
Special Partnership Characteristics and Considerations
New York State BID team:
Cornell University and Sciencenter
The NY BID partnership was a new (Emerging) partnership between an R1 research university and a small non-profit science museum at the onset of this project.
University Partner Overview:
ISE Partner Overview:
Special Partnership Characteristics and Considerations
Wisconsin State BID team:
University of Wisconsin-Madison and Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery
The Wisconsin BID partnership was an existing partnership between an R1 research university, University of Wisconsin-Madison and a Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation (WARF) public engagement with science program on the UW-Madison campus.