University of Washington Final Project Report
Organization of Student Grant and Funding Initiatives at the UW Information School
Peter Ellis, Emily (Kuan-Chi) Huang, Meredith Slane, Al Youngblood
IMT 580 – Management of Information Organizations
Winter Quarter, 2008
Professor Jochen Scholl
1. Executive Summary
2. The Managerial Toolset
2.1 Problems and Tasks Within Managerial Area
2.2 Problems and Tasks Addressed by Toolset
2.3 Components
2.4 Features
2.4.1 Grant Component
2.4.2 Research Component
2.5 Specific Purposes
2.6 Technology Involved
2.7 Users
2.8 Uses.
2.9 Findings and Results
2.10 Insights From Analysis
2.11 Comparison Between Tools
2.12 Modification of Toolset
2.13 What was Learned
3. Group Process
3.1 Formation
3.2 Storming
3.3 Norming
3.4 Performing
3.5 Insights of Learning Process
3.6 Doing The Process Differently
4. Final Thoughts and Remarks
5. Appendix and Tables
5.1 System Graph and Notes
5.2 Slide Presentation
I. Executive Summary
The Student Grants Initiative is a subcomponent of the overarching University of Washington Information School Strategic Plan that identifies long-term commitments to transform the iSchool into a world-class academic institution. Although the Strategic Plan has yet to be fully implemented, goals have been set in some areas (like the Student Grants Initiative) with relatively minor discussion over the what processes might achieve these goals. Meetings with Ann Corboy (Administrative Services Specialist), Wendie Phillips (Director of Student Services), and Alpha DeLap (Director of Research Services) have helped us identify the main considerations associated with increasing access to research grants and funding, and to approach the underlying information grounds from a sensible direction.
As both stakeholders and students, we were able to contribute significantly to the design of this project. Our “insider” perspective as students allowed us to express student needs previously unconsidered by the iSchool. Together with the information gleaned from our meetings with Alpha, we designed the idea of our managerial toolset and formed a set of system recommendations. Our two-part design (Grants and Research) should be implemented as either a new SharePoint site or simply be an addition to current iSchool website.
The Grants component is a resource aimed at both faculty members and students to address grant finding, application, and information sharing. Six main subcategories are described. On the Research side, faculty members can post their ongoing research (both funded and unfunded) and advertise for open student assistant positions in addition to searching through student profiles in order to match their research specializations with those of students. Students benefit by participating in a forum where they can advertise their own research interests directly to faculty. Increased student and faculty research collaboration is a key goal of our toolset.
II. The Managerial Toolset
Problems and Tasks Within Managerial Area
Though we originally intended to focus on organizing, our meetings with Wendie Phillips (Student Services) and Alpha DeLap (Research) highlighted the fine line between planning and organizing. Our initial assumption that the Strategic Plan’s Grant Initiative had addressed all aspects of planning was, in fact, incorrect. While organizational goals had been set, departmental goals still remained and no action plan to implement these goals existed.
We discussed setting “supporting goals for the department” (Dessler 179) with Alpha which helped in aligning her goals with those of the iSchool. Alpha’s vast individual responsibilities often coincided with those of her research department. Together we formulated “strategies to achieve the strategic goal,” (190) though these strategies are yet to be implemented.
Our efforts also addressed organizing. We concentrated on three main organizing aspects: identifying job tasks, hiring people, and integrating work product. Identifying, in our case, focuses on finding grant sources, connecting students to grants and researchers, and tracking previous grant recipients. Hiring deals with identifying the right person to contact for questions on student grants and research projects. Lastly, integrating involves implementing our toolset to help staff facilitate research collaboration between students and faculty.
Problems and Tasks Addressed by Toolset
Several problems exist with the current student grants process at the iSchool. First, information regarding student grants is unorganized and time consuming to search. Second, information to assist students through long, complicated grant applications is missing. Third, no tracking of successful grant applications exists. Lastly, students and faculty lack a means to share research information. Our managerial toolset hopes to solve these problems.
Components
The Grants Component addresses the basic needs of identification, application, and sharing of grant information and is discussed in section 2.4.1. The Research Component disseminates research information to faculty, staff, and students and is discussed in section 2.4.2.
Information exchange via RSS feeds, instant messaging, and other media, play a supporting role as a toolset component by increasing information interaction between separate toolset subcomponents. The Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) component answers questions that a user might experience—i.e., how the application process works, explaining grants, scholarships, or fellowships, or what a beginning researcher should know. FAQs will be available throughout the toolset and have a feedback option.
Features
In developing toolset features, we preferred simple, intuitive features that are accessible and easily read. It is all too easy to over-burden a student with options (much as GFIS does).
Grant Component
- Tracking My Grant: Personal deadlines are tracked both manually and automatically (in the case of grants managed through the Office of Development). Quick links to specific grants and summaries of each would be shown. An exportable calendar would also be available.
- What Grants are Available: This feature searches available funded grants, requests for proposals (RFPs), locally funded grants, and calls for proposals. A grant summary is listed and relevant deadlines would also be shown. Advanced search features are be available.
- How Can I Apply: This feature begins the application process for a particular grant.
- What Does A Funded Grant Look Like: A detailed description of previously funded grants
Includes templates and samples of successful application essays.
- Grant Experiences: This section offers tips, advice, and an introduction to outside grant funding, in addition to recordings and transcripts of panel discussions or seminar. Upcoming funding events and training sessions would be included.
- Grant Stats and Archive: Notes and statistics on previous grant applications would give students useful information to manage their time effectively and target attainable grants.
Research Component
- Student Side. An “About Me” profile describes research interests, projects, recommendations, and includes a biographical description for students to promote themselves.
- Faculty Side. Funded and unfunded “work in progress” is listed in addition to faculty profiles. Alpha DeLap noted that unfunded or unbudgeted research is important and could eventually lead to funded research. Students can search through specific topics or faculty.
Specific Purposes
The Grant and Research Portal will increase both the information interoperability among iSchool stakeholders and research collaboration among students and faculty. We firmly believe that a search tool to find available grants and research opportunities achieves the aims of the Grants Initiative by making obscure research networks more transparent and open to different voices. Research standards increase with greater participation and ownership of the grant process.
Technology Involved
We propose that our toolset be implemented either as an extension to the existing iSchool website (and its associated content management backend) or as a SharePoint site. A SharePoint site would integrate cleanly with the iSchool’s current planning to upgrade its SharePoint intranet; thus, we recommend this as the best available option if all the technical components can be worked out. This solution takes advantage of the features listed above. Toolset components should be integrated with the Office of Research’s most recent revision of its content on the iSchool website, and it should be part of an overall Strategic Goal to increase the Office’s visibility within the iSchool. Lastly, care should be taken to ensure that this technological assistance does not detract or distract from the importance of the Strategic Planning process.
Users
First and foremost, Alpha and Wendie will be the primary users of this tool to disseminate updated information on grants. Students of the iSchool are another group of users as they research information on grants and research projects. Faculty members of the iSchool will also be users by advertising their research projects and by searching for compatible research assistants. Lastly, current or potential sponsor organizations are also users of this toolset because they will view information to determine sponsorship commitments with the iSchool.
Uses
The most immediate use of the Grants and Research website will be from eager iSchool students and faculty who currently lack this resource. Currently, faculty, staff, Student Services, and research groups send information publically via listservs and forwarded email, and privately through networks of colleagues and associates. The GFIS database is a useful tool, but it lacks a sense of “ownership” by the iSchool community.
Another source of information flow is Alpha DeLap, who acts as a single channel of communication between multiple stakeholders. As the iSchool grows in size and in stature, this approach will work against the growth of research initiatives. Besides the functional attributes of individual toolset components, we hope that some of our recommendations help guide the Student Grants subcomponent of the Strategic Plan.
Findings and Results
During our second meeting with Alpha DeLap, we presented a rough sitemap of the components that our toolset would incorporate based on our previous first meeting. The feedback we received was mostly very positive. She specifically liked the “Research” portion of the toolset, because she felt this was an area not being addressed adequately. Alpha also pointed out technical difficulties in implementing the tracking feature of the toolset because it involves integration of various information systems. We discussed access to the website. Our view is that it should be available only to iSchool students who would provide control over its usage. In addition, there was some question as to the feasibility of a “Help Desk” toolset feature. We also incorporated other topical suggestions offered by Alpha into our toolset.
Insights From Analysis
After our second meeting with Alpha, the group modified the toolset according to Alpha’s recommendations. We learned that there is an urgent need to connect students and faculty together here in the iSchool in order to foster an environment that rewards research. Alpha’s positive feedback and attentiveness during our meetings showed her sincere interest in implementing our toolset. However, due to our project’s limited scope, we did not create a working mockup for review, which might have elicited greater participation from stakeholders.
Comparison Between Tools
Many tools exist to manage information dissemination and to gather information resources. Dessler talks about a number of toolsets in Chapter Five (“Information and Knowledge Management”) and Chapter Fifteen (“Improving Communication”, though some parts of Chapters Six and Ten arguably are relevant.
First, we suggest data mining with a human filter as a means to determine the most relevant funding source to be posted on the proposed website to meet the needs of students and faculty. While data mining is not a direct aspect of the proposed toolset, it can be compared here because its output becomes part of the toolset itself, and is thus a prerequisite.
The key concept of data mining is “find[ing] new, hidden, or unexpected patterns in data” (Dessler 119). Our project hopes to do this by establishing an archive of past funding requests that individuals can then mine within their search for funding information. We hope to help participants filter out information they do not need and to help prevent information overload (Dessler 440-1). Data mining is a latent feature of our toolset.
We facilitate this project using the Internet as a communications medium via SharePoint, which is a piece of collaboration software. While it is certainly possible to implement this system using other toolsets – for instance, the use of a portal rather than a collaborative system (Dessler 451) – since the primary goal of the project is to increase contact between members of the iSchool community interested in information science research, collaboration software seems the most appropriate avenue to pursue.
It should be noted here that the University of Washington provides a system to locate funding, known as GFIS (Grants and Funding Information Service), and is administered by UW Libraries. We utilize this existing toolset to some extent in our project because some of the output from that system is utilized in the data mining process discussed earlier in this section. Due to the sheer volume of irrelevant system data—i.e., grants that do not apply to the study of information—we chose to allow the human data miner to utilize their own discretion when using information from the GFIS resource.
Modification of Toolset
First, because Alpha DeLap noted that the toolset is “student-centric” in its approach, we would involve non-iSchool stakeholders within the scope of our user group. Second, we will approach this project from a dual planning/organization approach, instead of using a single planning perspective. Third, we will perform comparative analysis outside of the UW community and evaluate other resources. Alpha’s points about “tapping” a whole set of student researchers highlighted the inadequacy the GFIS website and gave us a basis of comparison. Lastly, we should have surveyed stakeholders, especially faculty about the research component, to establish the reasonableness of our underlying assumptions. Nonetheless, we are confident that all of the components identified address stakeholder needs based upon our conversations, probing questions, notes, sketched, and feedback.
What was Learned
Through this project, we have learned that grants and connecting students with faculty members for research projects are both indispensable assets for the iSchool. Currently there is no real connection between the staff members that are in charge of the grant process and the students; therefore, there is a gap between the two parties which needs to be filled in order for students to benefit from grant resources. Also lacking is the information on research projects conducted by faculty members of the iSchool. This is detrimental to transforming the iSchool into an institution that rewards research. Therefore, our toolset has been designed based on these findings and hopes to address these problems so that students and faculty can work together towards transforming the iSchool into a world class institution.
III. Group Process
Formation
Forming, the initial stage that any team goes through in which “members learn about each other and the team’s goals, purpose, and lifespan” (Dessler 471), was initiated by e-mail contact between the group members. Our initial collaborations focused largely on attempting to define the scope of our project: what possibilities existed, what we wanted to present in our initial presentation, which organizational elements we wanted to help facilitate, and who would take leadership of the group? Leadership, initially, was not altogether clear, though it became clearer as we discussed what project we wanted to take on.
Our initial discussions with Student Services resulted in confusion amongst the group about what was actually going on. After a round of e-mails that helped to clarify why the group was reacting the way it was, we established that we wanted to focus on organization within the iSchool’s Strategic Planning process. At this point, we had yet to identify a specific facet of the Plan that we felt was relevant. Later informal meetings in person resulted in a brief study of each of the outlined aspects of the Strategic Plan and a decision that we wanted to focus exclusively on parts of the Plan that would directly impact our lives as students. We identified the iLearn section of the Strategic Plan as being most relevant.
During this stage, there was a fair amount of negotiation about whose information and connections should be used to further the project. Also, through a tacit process, it became apparent that Al would be the group leader, Emily would be the group secretary, and Peter and Meredith would play various supporting roles, from meeting coordination to editing to reality checking to articulating concerns about project direction. Norming for this group occurred reasonably quickly, since we recognized the need to begin involving other people from across the iSchool if we were to implement this project successfully.
One of our first actions was to meet with Ann Corboy, the iSchool’s Strategic Planning Coordinator, to gain her input on areas where she thought student input would have the greatest impact. Due to circumstances beyond our control, this meeting did not occur until late January.
Storming
Storming, the “stage of team development in which team members begin establishing goals, work processes, and individual roles” (Dessler 471), began when we started to meet with different stakeholders within the iSchool that were involved with the Strategic Planning process. As mentioned within the Formation section, we initially met with Ann Corboy during an informal meeting wherein we stated out focus on the iLearn component of the Strategic Plan. Ann helped us identify the Student Grant Support component of the Plan as our best option, and referred us to Alpha DeLap and Wendie Phillips, co-chairs for the Student Grant Component. A quick group debriefing established that we should set up an initial meeting with Wendie Phillips to gain some background on the grants process.
Interestingly, only three of the four group members were at the initial meeting with Ann (Meredith was sick). Meredith, nevertheless, accepted the conclusions that the majority of the group reached, and in so doing, demonstrated that our group roles, which initially became apparent during the Norming phase, had cemented.
At this point, our focus turned from establishing individual roles to determining processes and goals. One output the group establishment process was that we continued to be in regular contact with each other via e-mail. We also settled on having in-person meetings on Tuesdays and Thursdays of each week, as needed.
Our initial meeting with Wendie Phillips showed how concrete our roles had become at that point: Al was leading the discussion, Emily was taking notes, and Meredith and Peter were responsible for coming up with critical questions and providing background on our thinking regarding the project. The primary outcome of that meeting was a concern from Wendie that our scope might not “scale” well enough to what the Grants group needed or to our own timeline. This concern led to the group deciding to hold a meeting with Alpha DeLap.
Norming
Norming, the “stage of team development in which the team becomes more cohesive and clarifies members’ roles and responsibilities, team goals, and team processes” (Dessler 471), formally began during our initial meeting with Alpha DeLap. Much of the conversation during this meeting centered on the idea that we would create something that would assist in the Grants process. However, towards the end of the discussion, Alpha plainly stated that focusing attention on the student side of the Grants process and supporting student research were her primary information needs. This caused an epiphany within our group.
After our formal meeting with Alpha, the group held a quick debriefing in the lobby of the Research Commons. Meredith commented that she was unsure that the group had been approaching the project from the right direction and that she was concerned with our focus. Everyone concurred with that assessment. From that point forward we decided to focus on creating a platform for discussing research projects, finding assistance, and increasing the overall visibility of collaborations across the iSchool. However, given our timeframes and change of focus which would potentially mean a dual planning and organization approach, there were considerations that needed time to solidify. We decided to write individual summaries of our thoughts and e-mail one another following our discussion with Alpha.
Performing
Performing, the “stage of team development in which the team is cohesive, productive, and makes progress towards its goals” (Dessler 471), occurred roughly parallel to the norming phase. With the establishment of our goals after our initial meeting with Alpha, we were able to quickly begin formulating an approach to the problem. We produced a document that described central functionality for a website that would enable collaboration between researchers, faculty, and students at the iSchool. The team held a second meeting with Alpha to show her the document we had formulated, and it was received with great enthusiasm. Alpha helped us make adjust our proposal by providing her expert knowledge on how research is structured.
We set fairly informal goals amongst the group – mostly in the form of “by the next meeting, I’ll do this”. Meeting times were set in advance and negotiated among group members. The process allowed us to proceed at a pace that was reasonable to the entire group while still striving towards attaining the final goal that we had expressed.
Insights of Learning Process
The three most important things this group did right off the bat were to establish constant communication via e-mail, to schedule regular in-person meetings, and to have an unstated policy of decompressing after every meeting with a stakeholder within the iSchool. Establishing regular communication amongst group members helped us move beyond some initial confusion about which project the group was undertaking, and, as the group matured, helped us remain aware of what other group members were doing to help complete the project. Our regular in-person meetings provided an additional layer of communication and a form of fault checking. These meetings were often used to clarify what the goals of the group actually were, what tasks needed to be completed next, and to assign those tasks to the individuals with the expertise or knowledge to complete that task successfully. For instance, Peter (as a member of the group that with iSchool connections) sometimes ended up being the meeting scheduler. Emily and Al helped the group by recalling details of each meeting from their notes so that we could check what we thought had occurred to what each stakeholder had communicated to us on the record. Meredith sometimes acted as an informal referee and brought a “reality check” to discussions.
Decompressing after every meeting was also crucial, since it allowed us to reach a better understanding of our current status and assess what would happen next. These feedback sessions gave the group sufficient “free” space to reflect on findings from stakeholder meetings and also allowed us to clarify any vague or misunderstood points expressed or implied. Though group reactions and thoughts were actively elicited, a group consensus always emerged.
This project also introduced us to an aspect of the iSchool’s information services that can be of direct use in our futures studies—namely, the pursuit of research funding and job positions within the iSchool itself. In addition, another lesson taken from this experience was one of time management. Unfortunately, some of the group’s goals were not formally expressed until late in the quarter due to scheduling delays and a general lack of clarity about our project focus.
Doing The Process Differently
As mentioned in the last section, time management was a constant issue as we tried to nail down our project theme. We did not express formal milestones and instead opted for informal short run goals meant to bridge us to another stage or conduct further exploratory, fact-gathering session. Often we would walk out of a meeting with a statement as to what should happen by the next meeting, but no long-range planning.
Another point that we would have done differently was in our stakeholder identification. While Ann Corboy played a pivotal role in connecting us to the proper people, our initial meeting should have been with Alpha, since she knows much more about the research side of the iSchool with which grants are often connected. While Student Services plays a pivotal role in the promotion of research-related positions to students, this type of information, more often than not, originates from Alpha herself. It should be noted that while our final effort should incorporate both Research and Student Services, for most of own information identification and toolset development goals, Alpha was instrumental in giving us the perspective that we required to complete this project.
Finally, at the beginning of this project there was some confusion about the purposes of why a particular person was being contacted. Though necessary to eliminate project options, it made for confusion (and panic) amongst some group members. We should have appointed a single person to contact people and to make sure that everyone recognized the rationale behind contacting a potential stakeholder. However, by the end of this project, our team communicated regularly and was fully aware of decision rationale.
IV. Final Thoughts and Remarks
This project was an enriching experience for the group because it immersed us into the creative act of managing resources and information. This practical experience added an extra dimension of realism to class lectures and reading. Overall, we are hopeful that the results of this project are utilized to further the Information School’s research interests and to forge a stronger bond between students and faculty. We believe the toolset outlined above to be a robust solution, though we recognize the need for further study and conversation on this subject. We invite the Information School community to become further involved in this process and strongly recommend that those involved in the Grants portion of the Information School’s Strategic Plan consider this report as a part of their overall recommendations.
V. Appendix and Tables
System Graph and Notes
Color indicates major groupings of information. Blue is the actual Grant Component. Red is types of information resources. Green is the Research Portal. Orange is Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) for the different sections.
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