NSF TIP (Technology Innovation Partnership) offers several pathways for innovation. The NSF Pathways to Enable Open-Source Ecosystems (POSE) is focused on open-source development to create new technology solutions to problems of national and societal importance. Many NSF-funded research projects result in publicly accessible, modifiable, and distributable open-sourced software, hardware, or data platforms that catalyze further innovation. In some cases, an open-source product is widely adopted. It forms the basis for a self-sustaining open-source ecosystem (OSE) that comprises a distributed community of developers and a broad base of users across academia, industry, and government.
The POSE program aims to support managing organizations to facilitate the creation and growth of sustainable high-impact OSEs around already-developed open-source research products. This pathway to translate research results differs from programs like the NSF Innovation Corps (I-Corps™), Partnerships for Innovation, and Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer (SBIR and STTR), as it does not represent an integrated set of programs to provide researchers with the capacity to transform their fundamental research into deep technology ventures. POSE focuses on another translational lineage – supporting translation from research results to OSEs.
In most instances, there is a mandatory or highly encouraged evaluation component within these proposals. It is best practice to hire an external independent evaluator to avoid any perceived conflict of interest and show reviewers a level of understanding and attention to detail about the evaluation component. E.B. Howard Consulting has experience performing these evaluations for NSF-funded projects, as well as many others.
Your external evaluator should
- Be an experienced evaluator or evaluation firm (FYI – we are);
- Understand different evaluation practices and the role of each in different types of projects (FYI – we do) ;
- Have a working knowledge of all (not just the POSE program) NSF guidelines, protocols, processes, and evaluation requirements (FYI – we totally do).
Got questions on how to find an External Evaluator? We have you covered. Check out this post from August 2020. https://www.ebhoward.com/choosing-the-right-external-evaluator/
Want to know a little bit more about our Evaluation Services? We have you covered. See more here. https://www.ebhoward.com/evaluation-4/
Want to talk with us about how we serve as your External Evaluator for an NSF POSE proposal? Schedule a consult call today. https://calendly.com/ebhoward/15min
We work with high-growth startups and organizations that support the startup and innovation ecosystem. We build highly specific non-dilutive funding menus, provide proposal preparation services, and measure outcomes of funding through evaluation. Schedule a consult call with us HERE.