Contact: Kelly Green | Research Communications | 405-744-5827 | kelly.green@okstate.edu
OSU Research Week to Celebrate Creativity and Innovation
February 11, 2009 - Research Week, Oklahoma State University’s sixth annual event dedicated to the arts, humanities and sciences, will “Celebrate Creativity and Innovation” on Feb. 16-20, 2009, with a variety of presentations and happenings on the OSU-Stillwater campus. The event highlights the work of OSU scholars whose contributions help meet the needs of our society.
Research Week begins this year with the OSU Creativity Festival on Feb. 16-17 in the Student Union. A first-time event for OSU, the Festival is a part of OSU’s Creativity Initiative, which seeks to make OSU a national leader in creativity and innovation. In addition to workshops, panel discussions, creativity booths and demonstrations, and a Creativity Challenge, the Festival will feature two well-known speakers.
Chic Thompson, founder of the Creative Management Group and a creativity guru to Fortune 500 companies, will give the Festival’s plenary session, “The Power of Possibilities: Unlocking Creativity and Innovation at OSU,” on Feb. 16 at 9 am in the Student Union Case Study 2. Bob Mankoff, cartoon editor for The New Yorker, will give the Festival’s keynote presentation, “Laughing Outside the Box: Creativity and the Comic Imagination,” on Feb. 16 at 7:30 pm in the Student Union Theater.
World-renowned paleontologist Dr. Philip J. Currie will give the Research Week keynote address, “Hunting Dinosaurs from Pole to Pole,” on Feb. 18 at 7 pm in the Student Union Theater. Currie, who is the Canada research chair at the University of Alberta and the former curator of dinosaurs at the Royal Tyrell Museum of Paleontology, has conducted research on dinosaurs for more than 30 years with fieldwork concentrated in Alberta, Argentina, British Columbia, China, Mongolia, the Arctic and the Antarctic. His work has been featured in National Geographic and the New York Times. He has also appeared on NBC’s Today Show, PBS’s Nova, CBS’s dinosaur programs and The Discovery Channel.
Currie will also give the keynote address, “Controversies in Dinosaur Studies – Fur, Feathers, Hot-Blood and Extinction,” at the OSU Research Symposium on Feb. 18 at 1 pm in the Student Union Case Study 1.
Dr. Wanda E. Ward, deputy assistant director for health and human resources at the National Science Foundation, will present “Enabling STEM Talent, Discovery and Tools to Fuel Innovation” on Feb. 17 at 3 pm in the Student Union Case Study 1. Ward, who has served in a number of science and engineering policy, planning, and program capacities in her 17 years with the NSF, will discuss why it is critical to America’s economic competitiveness and quality of life to strengthen and expand the innovation workforce and enhance its capabilities for creativity and inventiveness through learning, discovery and development in the ecosystem of innovation.
Dr. Stephen McKeever, OSU vice president for research and technology transfer, will speak on Feb. 19 at 9 am in the Student Union Case Study 1. In this “State of Research” presentation, McKeever will discuss OSU’s record-setting increases in research during 2006, 2007 and 2008. He will present OSU’s successes, projections and challenges.
Immediately following McKeever’s presentation, Dr. John Solie, OSU Regents Professor and Sarkeys Chair in the department of biosystems and agricultural engineering, will discuss the development of the GreenSeekerTM, an optical-based sensor system created by himself and others at OSU. The system, which uses reflected light to determine nitrogen fertilizer application rates for field crops, has been successfully commercialized and is used by farmers throughout the U.S. and in other countries ranging from Canada to Kenya.
“Research Week is a once-a-year event that spotlights the great research and scholarship taking place throughout the OSU System every day,” said McKeever. “I hope many will join us as we celebrate the work ongoing and as we challenge ourselves to be more creative and innovative.”
A complete schedule of events is available at http://researchweek.okstate.edu.
