International Cooperation With Developing Countries OISE Advisory Committee, Oct. 28/07

1. International Cooperation With Developing CountriesOISE Advisory Committee, Oct. 28/07 Wayne Patterson Program Manager for Developing Countries Chair, Developing Countries Working Group

2. OISE Addressing Developing Countries Collaborations • Position of “Program Manager for Developing Countries” created in early 2006 • Wayne Patterson begins in August 2006 • Primary responsibility to develop mechanisms for increasing levels and types of support in developing countries

3. Seek Partnerships With Other Entities • Continue or initiate discussions with other funding agencies • US government • Other governments • Private sector • Foundations • Quasi-governmental agencies • Objective: co-funding with partners who are more able to support non-US participants in research

4. A “Thinktank” • In December 2006, the Developing Countries Working Group (DCWG) was formed • To serve as a forum inside OISE to initiate strategies, reflect on directions, discuss relevant issues • Patterson to serve as chair and “staff”

5. Representative from each regional group and front office: Eduardo Feller Garie Fordyce Rose Gombay Frances Li Libby Lyons Myra McAuliffe Ed Murdy Evan Notman Alex Stepanian Harold Stolberg Kathryn Sullivan Wayne Patterson, Chair Meetings open to all OISE Meets monthly DCWG Participants

6. Representative Topics Status of potential partnerships Development of strategy document “Brain drain, brain gain, brain circulation” Plant genome supplements in developing countries Sandwich programs 2009 Budget proposal “$100 computer”

7. 2009 Budget Recommendation Global Engagement Initiative to Increase Collaboration Research thrust will emphasize partnerships with external agencies through co-funding or supplements (Joint Programs with External Organizations: $1.5 million) and partnerships with the directorates with a model structurally like EPSCoR (Bubble Program: $1.5 million) Learning thrust will extend the PASI concept globally and seek to expand IRES through “IRES Mirror Programs” Transformative Science and Engineering thrust will be implemented through a pilot (Developing Countries Ramanujan Pilot Program: $0.5 million).

8. Ramanujan was born in Tamil Nadu, India in 1887. With almost no formal training in pure mathematics, Ramanujan studied mathematics on his own and worked as a clerk. G. H. Hardy, a towering figure in mathematics, had written several important research papers and influential textbooks. When Ramanujan wanted to get the opinion of British mathematicians to evaluate his discoveries, it was only natural that he close to write to Hardy. Actually Ramanujan communicated his remarkable findings to several British mathematicians, but it was only Hardy who responded. Realising that Ramanujan was a genius of the first magnitude, Hardy invited Ramanujan to Cambridge University, England. The rest is history. The collaboration between Hardy and Ramanujan was immense. The two letters Ramanujan wrote to Hardy in 1913 are considered to be among the greatest in mathematical history. Hardy's initial reaction on seeing the letters was that Ramanujan was a fraud because many of the formulas were known, some were incorrect, and there were no hints of proofs. But then there were several astonishingly beautiful formulas that were correct and very deep. Only a mathematician of the highest class could write them down. So, on second thought, Hardy concluded that it was more probable that Ramanujan was a genius and unlikely that he was a fraud because no one but a true genius could have the imagination to invent such formulae. Why “Ramanujan”?

9. Status of External Discussions • Active discussions are taking place with 10 entities for the possibility of co-funding international collaboration in developing countries. • This is an update on these negotiations as of the current date. • They are not presented in any particular order.

10. USAID • The Director of the Higher Education group at USAID, Martin Hewitt, has raised the possibility of expanding on his current policy of providing some Washington-based funds for projects supported by USAID missions to an approach where NSF and USAID would agree on a common theme, and invite missions to also fund with NSF and USAID Washington support for projects that would address the theme.

11. HED • The Higher Education for Development program, which competes various projects from USAID missions in the US higher education community, has been working with us to the extent that I have served as an observer on their recent review panels, with an eye to supplementing projects that may have a mutual interest to HED, USAID and NSF.

12. USDA • We have discussed the possibility of expanding on the Borlaug and Cochran Fellowship programs. These fellowships send agricultural scientists from developing countries for research mentorship in the US. NSF would consider supporting a later return visit by a US mentor to continue research collaboration with former Borlaug or Cochran Fellows in their home country. This could be either one-on-one or one-on-many.

13. World Bank • The Global Learning Development Network, a network of high-capacity video and multi-media conferencing facilities, has been made available to NSF to support research projects where international videoconferencing would aid in the research.

14. CAPES Brazil • The Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES) ministry in Brazil has offered to “mirror” the IRES program: the Brazilian students participating in an IRES project with US students (there are currently four such projects) will be supported by CAPES to return to the US participating university in the subsequent year, to continue the student research experience.

15. IRRI • The International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) in Los Baños, Philippines, receives the US portion of its operating budget from USAID. 8% of this allocation must be used for student exchange, which is currently used to support 8-10 US graduate students to conduct research at IRRI. I discussed with IRRI the possibility that NSF could supplement this amount to add further graduate students to the project.

16. NRCT • The National Research Council of Thailand (NRCT) is considering joining EAPSI. As well, they are looking into the possibility of “mirroring” IRES, as described above with CAPES.

17. Partnership for Higher Education in Africa • There have been several discussions about joint funding of specific research collaborations. At the moment, we are looking for an appropriate project that would meet both PHEA and NSF objectives.

18. MacArthur Foundation • MacArthur supports capacity building at a number of African universities. They are now interested in discussing the possibility of supporting more research-oriented projects which we might join.

19. UNESCO • UNESCO has expressed the desire to support non-US participants to travel to participate in any of our international workshops.

20. International Foundation for Science • The International Foundation for Science in Stockholm is interested in discussing joint funding. I expect to be able to meet with them within the next quarter.

21. What’s a Developing Country? NOT a subject of discussion Could lead to long debates, do we really want this? Are they developing economies, or developing science communities? Use an accepted model World Bank probably the best

22. Site Visits/Strengths Americas: December 2006 Brazil --- mathematics Chile --- physics Africa: June 2007 Ghana --- tropical biology Benin --- rice research, math/physics Niger --- atmospheric science Ethiopia --- earth science, anthropology/archaeology Southeast Asia: October 2007 Philippines --- rice research, marine science Indonesia --- earth and marine science Malaysia --- marine science Thailand --- chemistry, engineering

23. Presentations at US Universities California State University – Northridge California State University – Fullerton US University in US-Brazil FIPSE/CAPES Annual Meeting NSF Day – Tulane University Council of Historically Black Graduate Schools Conference of Southern Graduate Schools Vanderbilt University Clemson University US National Committee for Mathematics, The National Academies University of Washington Western Washington University Pennsylvania State University

24. Usual Comment at US Universities “I didn’t know NSF had international programs …” (with the exception of scientists in “field-based” disciplines)

25. Brown-Bag Series Generic title: “The State of Science in X” Where X = developing country To date: Nigeria, Chile Forthcoming: Brazil, Ghana, Philippines, South Africa

26. Brown-Bag Seminar: Noon – 1 pm, Friday, February 2 Room 970 Presenter: G. O. S. Ekhaguere President, International Centre for Mathematical and Computer Sciences Lagos, Nigeria Professor, Department of Mathematics, University of Ibadan Ibadan, Nigeria Dr. Ekhaguere is a leader among African mathematicians and physicists. He also recently served in the leadership of the Association of African Universities in Accra, Ghana. His studies were at Ibadan, Imperial College (London) and the University of London where he earned his Ph.D. in mathematical physics. In addition to being a faculty member at Ibadan since his Ph.D., he has been a visiting professor at Heidelberg, Bochum, Rome, Fukuoka, Western Cape, and the International Centre for Theoretical Physics in Trieste. Further information: Wayne Patterson, wpatters@nsf.gov or 8189 “The State of Science in Nigeria”

27. Brown-Bag Seminar: Noon – 1 pm, Monday, May 7 Room 1235 Presenter: Sergio Mujica Director of the Escuela de Ingeniería Informática Diego Portales University Santiago, Chile Sergio Mujica received his PhD from the Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science, University of California, Los Angeles. His main areas of interest are: the effective use of Internet, autonomous agent networks, distributed systems, grid computing, computer system security and the Open Source software impact. He has previously taught at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, and later the Universidad de Santiago, where he contributed to the creation of Chile’s first Computer Science programs. “The State of Science in Chile” He has served as a consultant for major firms, such as BCI Bank, Scotiabank, Banco de chile, Banco O’Higgins, Automóvil Club de Chile, IBM, Adexus, Lever Chile, Lotería de Concepción, and others. He is a member and Co-founder of the Sociedad Chilena de Ciencia de la Computación (SCCC), Member of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), Member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE), and Director of MundoOS. The IEEE has awarded him a recognition diploma for outstanding services to the Chilean Section of the Institute. Further information: Wayne Patterson, wpatters@nsf.gov or 8189

28. Sandwich Programs A “sandwich program” is normally thought of as a collaborative degree program between two institutions where the student in the program is required to complete part of the program at an institution other than the home institution --- in other words, the home institution provides both slices of bread, and the visited institution the meat in the middle. I had conducted a preliminary study of sandwich programs in 1999 while serving as Dean-in-Residence at the Council of Graduate Schools. Because the response to my inquiries concerning the existence of sandwich programs was so meager, I didn’t write up my findings. To my mild surprise, I have now received descriptions of literally dozens of such programs. The majority of them do NOT involve US institutions. There are North-North sandwiches (perhaps to be expected), North-South sandwiches, and also South-South sandwiches.

29. $100 Computer As part of a regular Developing Countries Working Group in the Office of International Science and Engineering, interest was expressed in having a “think tank” discussion on the potential impact of the proposed “$100 computer” for children and others in developing countries. At the same time, because of a dramatically increasing interest and commitment at the National Science Foundation in supporting cyberinfrastructure through high-performance computing, it was also decided to consider the impact of this movement on science in developing countries as well. Consequently, we developed a series of questions on these issues, and distributed them to a group of knowledgeable and thoughtful individuals throughout the world. The responses contained herein deliberately do not reflect lengthy study --- the questions were posed one week ago. Rather they reflect the instinctive and, in this view, perceptive responses of a very diverse group of individuals.

30. AAAS Symposium: Producing Scientists and Engineers in Developing Countries • SYNOPSIS • Higher education is undergoing many changes, in developing countries perhaps even more so than in the developed world. This symposium will attempt to discern some of these trends in higher education and how they will impact on the preparation of scientists and engineers in developing countries. In particular, the panel will address questions such as: How have universities throughout the world address the challenges in producing scientists and engineers prepared to address technological issues in the 21st century? Have universities sought greater collaboration (North-North, North-South, or South-South) in order to meet these challenges? Have joint degrees, dual degrees, or sandwich programs addressed these issues? Have these instances of collaboration succeeded or fail? Is brain drain still the dominant motivation for universities in developed countries in attracting students and faculty from developing countries? Have the concepts of "brain gain" and "brain circulation" developed momentum? Are these phenomena in science and engineering disciplines different from those across the Academy? How has the enormous increase in private university development impacted the pipeline in science and engineering disciplines? • Speakers: Carlos Azzoni, Dean of Economics, Universidade de Sao Paulo; G.B. Dielissen, Professor of Sociology, Universiteit Utrecht; Jan Persens, Director of International Relations, University of the Western Cape

31. Objectives FY 2008 • Conclude at least 3 external agreements • Pilot some approaches in the FY 2009 budget • Continue Working Group (expand?) • Catalyze new sets of collaborators throughout developing countries • Encourage “non-geographic” disciplines • Further research on program models (sandwich, computing, …) • Provide further visitation and outreach • Expand on “brown-bag” symposia

32. Further Information Wayne Patterson 703-292-8189 wpatters@nsf.gov