Maggie Pyle, Ph.D.
Director, Office of Sponsored
Programs
University of South Alabama
Mobile, AL 36688
www.southalabama.edu/osp (251)
460-6456
(251) 460-7955 fax
>>> xxxxxx@UALR.EDU
08/05/02 02:20PM >>>
Jim is right, as usual. We really don't
need a definition of the
field as much as a reasonable name for what we do,
since we do what
our organizations need for us to do.. That reasonable
descriptive
name has been a stumper for about 50
years.
Spanky
>Date: Mon, 05 Aug 2002 12:20:32
-0700
>From: "James R. Brett" <xxxxxx@CSULB.EDU>
>Subject:
Re: [RESADM-L]
>Sender: Research Administration List
<xxxxxx@hrinet.org>
>To: xxxxxx@HRINET.ORG
>Reply-to:
Research Administration Discussion List
<xxxxxx@hrinet.org>
>Organization: California State
University,
> Long Beach -- Office of University
Research
>X-Accept-Language: en
>
>?Sometimes someone in an
institution will get all distraught about the
>expression Research
Administrator. It is obvious to us that Research
>Administrators do not
administer research, but the term sometimes seems
>like an oxymoron to
people with an axe to grind.
>
>Research administrators provide
services, information, interpretation, and
>personal and career counseling
over a wide range of activities to other
>concerned people (including
students, faculty, other administrators,
>agency program officers,
auditors, the press, and politicians) in the
>various interfaces between
the institutional researcher and the rest of
>the world. The reason we do
not call ourselves Research Service,
>Information, Interpretation, and
Counselling Administrators is because the
>term is decidedly awkward and
would drastically change the names of our
>two main professional
organizations.
>
>The reason we have Research Administrators is
because researchers (and the
>people they typically encounter) are often
much too involved in their own
>specialties to become adequate in (enough
of) these interface areas to be
>successful. Persons in our
profession must be competent or knowledgable
>in accountancy, law,
government, politics, and general interpersonal
>relations, not to mention
being able to intelligently discuss what
>research is actually about over
a range of disciplines, sometimes needing
>to understand thoroughly
several cognate disciplines and sometimes to
>understand the research in
layman's terms in over a hundred
disciplines.
>
>Jim
>
>Mike McCallister
wrote:
>
>> This thing about research administration being
about IP? That
>> completely misses the point (Sorry
Charlie). IP is a small tail
>> wagging a big dog right now
and is used so much the term has lost
>> currency. IP
happens within research, sometimes. It is almost
>>
serendipitous. It certainly is not as big a deal as some want it
to
>> be, not yet.
>>
>> So what's
RA? What did you tell your Mom you do at work?
That's
>> what it is. It's what needs to be done for our
researchers and
>> faculty to create new knowledge, solve
problems, grow themselves,
>> even save the world, maybe.
But most of all what we do is help those
>> who can to do because
what they do is, by and large, important to
>>
society.
>>
>> Spanky
>>
>>
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>>
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>>
======================================================================
>
>--
>James
R. Brett, Ph.D., Director,
>Office of University
Research
>California State University, Long
Beach
>562-985-5314 562-985-8665 fax
>
http://www.csulb.edu/~research/>
>
>======================================================================
>
Instructions on how to use the RESADM-L Mailing List, including
>
subscription information and a web-searchable archive, are
available
> via our web site at
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Lists")
>======================================================================
--
Mike
McCallister, Ph. D.
Director, Research and Sponsored
Programs
University of Arkansas at Little Rock
2801 South
University
Little Rock, AR 72204-1099
(v) 501-569-8474
(f)
501-371-7614
(c) 501-590-5609
"The most exciting phrase to hear in
science, the one that heralds new
discoveries, is not 'Eureka!' (I've found
it!), but 'That's funny...'"
~ Isaac
Asimov
======================================================================
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on how to use the RESADM-L Mailing List, including
subscription information
and a web-searchable archive, are available
via our web site at
http://www.hrinet.org (click on "Listserv
Lists")
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