Building a Broader Impacts Toolbox: A Planning Conference on Facilitating the Meaningful Involvement of Researchers in Education and Outreach

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This award provides support for a two-day workshop that focuses on and initiates a broadened discussion of NSF Merit Review Criterion II - 'Broader Impacts.' The premise is that sharing ideas and practices regarding Criterion II can give rise to greater benefits from 'Broader Impact' activities. The goals of the workshop are (1) to identify existing resources across the MPS disciplines that are available to meet researchers' Broader Impact requirements and to enhance these activities; (2) to gather information from education and outreach professionals who regularly work with research scientists to determine Broader Impact tool needs and their discipline specificity; (3) to determine the types of materials (hardcopy, digital, web, other) that would likely be most useful for the more fulsome involvement of researchers in Broader Impact activities; and (4) to identify the best dissemination pathways for the tools that will be identified and developed. The 'Toolbox' metaphor has been chosen by the PI as a means of demonstrating the utility of shared experiences not only in meeting 'Broader Impact' requirements, but also in enriching Broader Impact activities. A group of two dozen scientists and educators, drawn from the range of MPS disciplines, have been invited to bring the experiences of their disciplines to the workshop. As background for progress on the goals above, invited participants are providing input via a website http://physics.unl.edu/~diandra/DLP_Group_Website/BIT/BIT.php that the PI has established for this purpose.