CCC is excited to see how our latest best-practice documents on interdisciplinary research for Funders, Researchers, and Organizational Leaders echo—and amplify—the strategic recommendations from the recent National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine’s (NASEM) report on The Science and Practice of Team Science. Below, we enumerate several recommendations presented in both sets of resources.   1. Seed Funding & Early Stage Support NASEM emphasizes the importance of pilot grants and flexible budgeting for early-stage interdisciplinary work. CRA/CCC’s Best Practices for Funders document mirrors this, recommending dedicated seed-stage funding, travel grants, and support for team-building workshops to kickstart cross-disciplinary collaboration. 2. Structural & Budgetary Flexibility NASEM urges institutions to adapt budgeting, […]

The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) recently released a memorandum to federal agencies to offer guidance on implementing the recent executive order on “Restoring Gold Standard Science”. The memo, authored by OSTP Director Michael Kratsios, offered nine key tenets for conducting scientific research, one of which was focused on “Collaborative and Interdisciplinary” research. Interdisciplinary research, the memo says, is “vital for generating new knowledge, as it fosters synergy, leverages complementary skills, and promotes the synthesis of ideas to raise new questions and tackle multifaceted problems that transcend traditional disciplinary boundaries.” The memo directed agencies to prioritize this type of interdisciplinary research, through improved collaboration between agencies […]

  Today marks a significant step forward in fostering groundbreaking interdisciplinary collaborations within the computing research community. The Computing Research Association (CRA) and CRA’s Computing Community Consortium (CCC) are proud to announce the release of a crucial new document: Catalyzing Interdisciplinary Computing Research: Best Practices for Organizational Leadership. For years, it has been widely acknowledged that computing research holds immense potential to address society’s most complex challenges. However, unlocking this potential through large-scale societal impact hinges on effective interdisciplinary collaborations. Despite decades of research into optimal interdisciplinary practices, researchers continue to face significant hurdles. This new document directly confronts these challenges, offering actionable recommendations for leaders across research sectors.   […]

  Interdisciplinary research in computing is vital for addressing complex societal challenges. However, despite its importance, fostering successful interdisciplinary collaborations remains a significant challenge. The Computing Research Association (CRA) and its Computing Community Consortium (CCC) gathered insights from 40 experts across academia, industry, and government through a series of roundtable discussions to identify challenges in interdisciplinary research. The results of these discussions are being published in a series of best practices documents. The first, published in July 2024, recommended best practices for researchers collaborating on interdisciplinary teams. This second paper of the series focuses on how these collaborations can be better supported by funders, including government agencies, industry, philanthropic donors, […]

Four years ago the Computing Community Consortium (CCC) launched the Postdoc Best Practice Program (Postdoc BP), designed to develop, implement and institutionalize the implementation of best practices for supporting postdocs. The Postdoc BP program was initiated due to a 157% rise[1] in computing postdocs between 2005 and 2010, which demanded attention from the computing community. A Steering Committee, led by Anita Jones (University of Virginia), was assembled to choose a set of institutions or consortia to design and investigate potential best practices for these postdocs. Ultimately, the CCC awarded grants to three institutions/consortia: The University of Washington, led by Brian Curless and David Rispoli; Arizona’s Foundational Model for Postdoctoral Programs […]

The Communications of the ACM (CACM), the print and online publication for the Association of Computing Machinery (ACM), has recently released a Viewpoints article titled, “Ask Not What Your Postdoc Can Do for You” from the leads of the Computing Community Consortium’s (CCC) Postdoc Best Practices program (Postdocs BP). The program, with the backing of the National Science Foundation (NSF), will conclude this summer.  The Postdocs BP program was a follow-on to the Computing Innovation Fellows project, which ran from 2009 – 2014.  Three different universities/consortia received awards in 2014 to develop, implement and institutionalize the implementation of best practices for supporting postdocs in computing. The three groups are: The University […]