Over 200 MIT Graduate Students Urge Senator Brown to Support Science Research

Cambridge, MA - August 10, 2010 - Over 200 graduate students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) recently signed on to an open letter delivered to Senator Scott Brown, urging his support for federally-funded research. The letter notes the job-creating power of science and engineering research and highlights how businesses created by members of the MIT community have an enormous impact on the Massachusetts economy. The Science Policy Initiative (SPI) at MIT sponsored the open letter, a copy of which can be found online at http://web.mit.edu/spi/openletter/.

The letter follows an April visit by members of SPI with Senator Brown's Washington office staff on federal research funding and the 2010 America COMPETES Act, which would reauthorize funding for three large governmental research agencies. Originally passed in 2007 with broad bi-partisan support and signed by President Bush, the America COMPETES Act aims to steadily increase the investments in innovation-building research that keep the US economy competitive. The America COMPETES Act also supports education in innovation-related fields such as science and engineering.

SPI is working with MIT alumnus and Analog Devices co-founder Ray Stata, as well as the Massachusetts High Technology Council, of which Mr. Stata is a founding member, in supporting the America COMPETES Act and promoting that federal research funding is integral to a robust innovation economy such as that of Massachusetts. As noted in the open letter to Senator Brown, the business community at large, including the US Chamber of Congress and the Business Roundtable, has endorsed passage of the America COMPETES Act because of its job-creating potential.

The Science Policy Initiative aims to educate graduate student scientists and engineers on the policies that affect their research careers. Founded in 2006 by a group MIT graduate students, SPI hosts a week-long course, hosted by MIT Washington, DC, office director, on the economic underpinnings of research policy and sponsors a two-day trip to Washington to connect graduate students with policy-makers. For more information, visit http://web.mit.edu/spi/.

Contact: sciencepolicy@mit.edu

SPI co-presidents
Megan Brewster
Bridget M. Dolan

SPI Media Director
Noah Spies

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Updated March 17, 2013

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