If you are like me, you probably anguished over (maybe you didn’t?) what your New Year’s resolutions would be for 2014. By any chance did one of yours include, “I am going to organize my garage and get rid of a few things,” or maybe, “I am going to choose an exercise regime and stick with it,” or perhaps something as ambitious as, “I am going to make the world a better place?”
But wait a minute -- you already have that last one covered! In fact, as a technology transfer professional, you make the world a better place every day as you collaborate with researchers and inventors to transform technologies into products that impact our lives.
This important work is all around us, and you can see many compelling examples featured in AUTM’s Better World Project 2013 Year in Review. I invite you to take a minute to browse through this compilation of intriguing innovations and their journey into the marketplace. See if your institution or one of your colleagues contributed to the Better World Project (see list below.) If you recognize someone, why not give them a shout-out, or a tweet, or even just a “way to go!” email? They will appreciate your recognition and, as the adage goes, it takes a village to make things happen. We can and we do make a difference.
I will close with a request to add one more New Year’s resolution to your list: Why not submit a technology to the Better World Project? It’s easy to do and only takes about five minutes. Just go to the Better World Project site at www.betterworldproject.org, log in using your AUTM credentials, and click the green “Add Your Story to the Database” button. That’s it. Once approved, your story will join hundreds of others in the Better World Project Database. An added incentive is that it will automatically be considered for a Featured Story.
It’s a great way to highlight your accomplishments and share them with potential collaborators, your inventors, or anyone else you might want to impress.
If you have any questions, feel free to contact the Managing Editor, Lisa Richter, at lrichter@autm.net.
Thank you for all that you do,
Betsy Merrick
AUTM Board Member: VP for Communications & Marketing
2013 Better World Project Contributors
Argonne National Laboratory
BloodCenter of Wisconsin
Emory University
KU Leuven Research and Development
National Institutes of Health
North Carolina State University
Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile
Portland State University
University of Minnesota
University of South Florida
University of Tennessee Research Foundation
University of Utah