Posts
If there is one thing that Space Grant is not… it's not
boring. Nervous waiting,
last-minute rescheduling, dynamic rebalancing and reprioritization, and
unexpected novelty have all been part of the action since our Affiliates
Meeting two weeks ago. (By the
way, if you didn't make it, we missed you. You could have helped us finish some of the food we
ambitiously ordered from Adelino's.)
As promised and intended, the INSGC Central Office submitted
our Annual Performance Data (APD) report on Friday (yes, April 13) after the
meeting; I was able to add a few details mentioning our rich and very helpful
discussions about our SMART Objectives, and the Affiliates' engagement in
"Next Big Thing" discussions and priorities. Officially, our submission of the APD
begins the formal process of gaining approval for the 2012-13 Base budget for
the program year beginning May 17.
As I had mentioned, we are very excited and proud of the
INSGC-supported group of students whose Student
Spaceflight Experiments Project is due to launch on the SpaceX / Dragon mission
representing the first commercial launch to the ISS. I was able to pry open a small window of time to attend the
launch on April 30… but the launch
was delayed until May 7 (right in the middle of finals and grading for
me). Sigh. Oh, well.
However, lest I spend too much time sulking and brooding, I got
some very good information on Tuesday.
Our Augmentation funding has arrived from NASA Shared Services! Yes, the moment we've been waiting for,
and now subcontracts can be written, additional support can be allocated, and
we can even look at repurposing some funds to make sure students can start on
their summer NASA Center internships.
This is the source of a huge sigh of relief from Angie, and from Dawn,
and from me. It will still take
some time to get all of the paperwork through Sponsored Programs, but we are
focusing on that now.
Interestingly, one of this month's Wired Magazine's cover articles is "7 Ways to
Spot the Next Big Thing".
Funny, I don't remember any journalists in the audience during our
Affiliates Meeting, but that's exactly what we were discussing. It's clear that we're on our way
already. Based on discussions with,
and activities led by, our new INSGC Partners, Indiana Afterschool Network, and Wisdom Tools, INSGC will continue to be
involved with the NDIA
/ AIA discussions to address STEM
education and employment in Indiana.
This is certainly a
challenge we cannot wait to address.
I could go home now, and wait to post this on Monday… no, I
have been doing enough waiting.
Copy, paste, post… doing is better.
