LSU A&M’s Response (Continued - 2)

Table 20 provides a comparison of engagement activity in relation to our identified peer institutions for 2012 via the standard intellectual property measures. These data come from the Association of University Technology Managers (AUTM) annual licensing survey. These figures vary somewhat from the figures provided above for both LSU and for peer institutions, because reporting practices of the various institutions vary from survey to survey (e.g., with respect to the AUTM survey compared to the NSF HERD survey). The figures presented below, for instance, for the University of Illinois capture both the Urbana-Champagne and Chicago campuses, even though the Urbana-Champagne campus is the one identified as the LSU A&M peer institution. In addition, the LSU figures cover the entire system, not just LSU A&M and the fellow Baton Rouge campuses as in the NSF HERD survey. With these caveats in mind, ORED uses these data to benchmark against peers for points of improvement. Specifically, the data indicate that while the research expenditures performance metric places LSU roughly in the middle of its peers, there is significant room for improvement in terms of disclosures and patents. In response to this, ORED has worked with the Office of Intellectual Property, Commercialization, and Development to implement workshops for faculty on intellectual property issues such as when and how to disclose potential inventions or apply for patents [27]. 

Collaborations

LSU also vigorously engages the local and state business communities to foster economic development through research relationships [28]. Examples of the kinds of qualitative data collected routinely by ORED to assess these processes and outcomes are provided below.

The Louisiana Business & Technology Center (LBTC) and the LSU Innovation Park operate as the economic development arm of the university and are active with Louisiana Economic Development (LED), Louisiana Industrial Development Executives Association (LIDEA), and other state, local, and regional economic development groups. The LBTC has helped 62 Louisiana businesses win $23,150,000 in SBIR grant funding since 2008.  Many LBTC incubator clients have won these research grants, including Mezzo, Electrochemical Materials, Enervana, and Invertherm.  Since 1999, 188 LBTC clients have won over $55.8 million in awards, the funds of which are spent in Louisiana on payroll and purchases. 

The LBTC works with 34 incubator companies, 39 student incubator companies, five research park companies, and over 200 affiliate companies annually on developing technologies and business plans, and on the commercialization of technologies.  Currently, there are over 300 jobs at the LSU Innovation Park/LBTC, with an average salary of $60,000.  Moreover, the LBTC has documented the creation or saving of nearly 10,000 jobs since its inception. The 39 student incubator companies and the 30 student incubator graduates have created over 120 jobs, thus slowing the exodus of LSU graduates from Louisiana. The LBTC documents about six company graduations and eight-to-ten incubator startups annually, and has assisted more than 200 companies as affiliated companies with start-up or expansion. In addition, LED, the U.S. Department of Commerce, and other agencies are providing funding to the LBTC to develop an international trade and export assistance program to assist Louisiana businesses develop export programs and to stimulate direct foreign investment in Louisiana.  The LBTC is also designated by the NBIA as a "Soft Landing Incubator" to provide space and services to foreign companies interested in establishing a U.S. presence.  The LBTC has two international companies that have documented in excess of $5 million in annual sales.

The LBTC collaborates with LED, LABI, LIDEA and the regional chambers in the 11 parishes surrounding East Baton Rouge.  LBTC staff members serve on the boards and committees of many economic development entities in the region and on committees statewide.  The LBTC provides leadership to the Louisiana Business Incubation Association and has assisted most incubators in the state with start-up. The LBTC offers services to Louisiana Tech University, to the New Orleans BioInnovation Center, and to the Pennington Biomedical Research Foundation, assisting in business formation and job creation. Although the summary above provides useful information on recent activities, it is enlightening to contextualize the impact of the LBTC with a longer range view. Data provided below by the LBTC demonstrate the enduring impact on economic activity that this branch of LSU exhibits.

LBTC Overall Impact [Jan 1999 – Sept 2012]

• $163,657,649 in equity, grants and loans
• 6,418 businesses & entrepreneurs received technical and management assistance
• 4,034 projects completed
• 2,214 companies received Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) support
• 554 businesses started after receiving assistance, creating or saving at least 9,690 jobs
• 489 training events for 21,424 participants
• 28 Incubator Tenant Companies creating 140 full time jobs in Baton Rouge

• 140 graduated tenants with 2,278 jobs created since 1989
• 110 still in business = 78% success rate

• Since its inception in 2010, the Student Incubator Program has assisted 52 student businesses. The program has resulted in 25 businesses in operation, 53 jobs created, and 11 graduated businesses.

With respect to another significant locus of collaborative activity, the College of Engineering, the number of companies funding research projects with this college has increased approximately 8% from FY11 to FY12 to include 40 companies. On average, the College of Engineering Office of Corporate Relations and Economic Development hosts four multi-disciplinary campus visits per month for companies to interact and gauge interest with university faculty and research centers. This number does not account for site visits to corporate facilities, which average four per month. With an increase in student enrollment of 41% over the last five years, the Office of Corporate Relations and Economic Development has worked to increase the number of companies recruiting LSU engineers by 20% (192 total companies recruiting) over the past year. Through strategic efforts, outreach has been targeted to Louisiana-based companies.

The college also has worked to create links with LED and with the state’s seven regional economic development organizations to continue to support regional economic development efforts. Activities include attending and participating in client recruitment efforts with LED, BRAC, GNO Inc., NLEP, and LEDA (at least 11 within the current FY, July 1 - March 9).  In addition to its collaboration with these organizations, the college has extended partnerships with the small-business and entrepreneurship community in Louisiana by assisting in the connection of small businesses to faculty expertise through SBIR grants in partnership with LBTC; in partnering with LBTC, Louisiana Technology Park, SpringBoard Baton Rouge, and LaunchPad New Orleans to assist small businesses in their workforce recruitment efforts; in participating with the Louisiana Innovation Council commercialization working group for the advancement of technology transfer; and in chairing the technology committee and participating in the academic committee through the Louisiana Technology Council.

The College of Engineering is an active partner with the Greater Baton Rouge Industry Alliance, the Louisiana Chemical Association, and the Baton Rouge Area Digital Industries Consortium, and has given presentations to their respective groups over the last year to further develop relationships and align the college with needs of industry. The college has also invited the membership of each of these trade organizations to participate in the newly created research clusters. The college, its departments, and its diversity programs host nine different industrial advisory boards, with meetings semi-annually consisting of more than ten corporate partners in each group that assist in guiding programmatic, research, academic, and philanthropic efforts. Since July 2012, the college has held over 75 introductory meetings with corporations to build connections through research and recruitment with the faculty and students within the college.

The Division of Economic Development, housed in the Department of Economics within the E.J. Ourso College of Business, works extensively with a number of agencies on Louisiana economic development initiatives [28]. Under a standing contract with LED, the division provides impact studies to evaluate the economic impact and tax revenue streams associated with proposed economic development projects.  The division also provides one-time studies on specific topics, such as the export content of various business sectors for LED. Additionally, the division works extensively with the Louisiana Workforce Commission on a variety of projects related to evaluating the needs of employers in Louisiana and better educating or training workers to take advantage of opportunities in Louisiana. The division also provides regular reports to the Department of Health and Hospitals on the number of uninsured children and adults.  Likewise, the division provides an annual Tourism Satellite Account report to the Louisiana Department of Culture, Recreation, and Tourism based on measures of the number of jobs and tax dollars attributable to tourism.  The division is also currently working on a project to quantify the economic value and potential economic impact of coastal erosion in Louisiana and on the state and nation as a whole.

The College of Science remains heavily engaged with industrial sponsors in R&D activity that is pertinent to economic development issues. Through grants and contracts with approximately 30 industrial and non-academic sponsors, faculty in the departments of geology, biological sciences, chemistry, mathematics, physics and astronomy, and those affiliated with the Center for Advanced Microstructures and Devices, were awarded more than $3,170,000 in funds to support this activity.

Others:  A number of other activities take place that are important for economic development efforts, though rather more indirectly. In the College of Humanities and Social Sciences, the Southern Regional Climate Center, the Southern Climate Impacts Planning Program, and the Louisiana Office of State Climatology—all of which are based in the Department of Geography and Anthropology—work together to provide short- and long-term climate data to various businesses, private industries, individuals, and other stakeholders for the state and the region.

In addition, the Highway Safety Research Group (HSRG), a division of the Information Systems and Decision Sciences Department within the College of Business, works with over 180 law enforcement agencies in the state concerning traffic safety, an important consideration for strategic economic development and the encouragement of business growth [29].  Besides providing data to many local, state, and federal agencies, the HSRG assists the Motor Carrier Safety Assistance Program Division of Louisiana State Police with reporting Commercial Motor Vehicle Crash data to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration.  Additionally, working with the Department of Transportation and Development, the HSRG assists with the reporting of fatal crash data to the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration. Utilizing business intelligence systems developed in-house, the HSRG analyzes crash-related data at the request of the Louisiana Highway Safety Commission, the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development, the Louisiana Division of the Federal Highway Safety Administration, the Louisiana State Police, and local sheriffs’ offices and police departments.  By performing safety studies and supplying crash data, the HSRG assists projects designed to decrease the number of fatal and serious injury crashes occurring on Louisiana’s roadways, thus supporting processes for making Louisiana more attractive to potential employers.

Likewise, the LSU Office of Social Service Research and Development has partnered with the Office of the Mayor-President, the district attorney, and local law enforcement to develop and implement the Baton Rouge Area Violence Elimination program to help reduce violent crime in socioeconomically distressed communities in Baton Rouge [30]. Crime and fear of crime are major impediments to successful implementation of economic development strategies, and this community violence reduction strategy has important implications for future economic development initiatives in communities where it is most needed.

Finally, the College of Human Sciences and Education has in-place more than 25 distinct community engagement and grant-supported programs that address academic preparedness among the K-12 student population and among existing educators [31]. Sound educational foundations are vital to the future of the state and local workforce needs, and while it is more difficult to discern any immediate impact of these activities on economic development, the long term expectation is that such efforts will positively impact economic development in the local community and throughout the state.

As a further indicator of LSU’s impact and engagement with the state economic system, data pertaining to the dollar amount of research expenditures in Louisiana’s key economic development industries are routinely tabulated and assessed. To develop this classification system, data for the disciplines of engineering, the physical sciences, the environmental sciences, mathematical sciences, life sciences (with the exception of the natural science museum and communication disorders), a small  number of social sciences, a small number of units labeled ”other sciences,” and some non-science and engineering fields are considered to be aligned with the key economic development industries identified in the states Blue Ocean and FIRST Louisiana documents for the purposes of reporting to the LA GRAD Act. When compared to Table 12 above, the data provided in Table 21 reveal that the vast majority of the research funding expended at LSU is aligned with the state economic development growth areas.   

Measures of Accountability

State-wide

Information relating to the previously described research and the progress the institution has made is produced annually in the spring and reported to the Louisiana Board of Regents in the form of a Metrics Report (research expenditures) and GRAD Act Report (institution-wide metrics). 

Institutional

ORED undergoes the institutional process for internal program review. In 2012, the review procedure initiated by the University Review and Assessment Council (URAC) included (1) a self-study [32], (2) an external review by the vice provost for research at the University of Georgia [33], and 3) an internal review [34].  

This year-long examination identified the strengths and weaknesses of the office and provided an action plan designed to improve the impact of the office. The specific recommendations were (1) to facilitate faculty engagement in interdisciplinary projects, (2) to ensure appropriate safeguards are in place for research compliance, (3) to develop universal data management protocols for the university, (4) to develop a plan to address intellectual property, commercialization and development, and (5) to develop a plan to address ORED’s role in on-line courses and technology with regards to graduate education. Action items for all of these recommendations are either completed, ongoing, or in-progress.

The three reports were consistent in requesting additional funding for the office, refining the strategic plan for the office, and developing a robust annual report. The ORED 2013 Action Plan is an example of incorporating the suggestions of all the reports into a product that will both increase ORED strategic initiatives and provide summary progress each year in the unit’s annual report.