The Kent State University Department of Biological Sciences will host its annual research symposium from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on March 31, in Room 204 of the Kent Student Center. Symposium activities are free and open to the public. 

This year’s keynote address will be delivered by Dr. Clifford Gabriel, senior advisor, Office of Integrative Activities within the Office of the Director of the National Science Foundation. Gabriel will discuss the NSF’s new funding priorities and how these priorities are set. A focus of the speech will also be the NSF’s efforts in funding transformative research, including a discussion of the evolving definition of that new focus in the sciences and engineering.

Additionally, Gabriel will address career paths in science and engineering for students, with an emphasis on undergraduates preparing for the job world. Clifford’s address will take place from 11 a.m. to 12:15 p.m. A poster exhibit of student work follows in the afternoon.

The NSF is an independent federal agency created by Congress in 1950, tasked with keeping the United States at the leading edge of discovery in the sciences. Its annual budget is more than $6 billion. In addition to funding research in traditional academic areas, the agency also supports "high-risk, high pay-off" ideas, novel collaborations and numerous projects that may seem like science fiction today, but which the public will take for granted tomorrow. A key function of the NSF is to ensure that research is fully integrated with education so that today's revolutionary work will also be training tomorrow's top scientists and engineers.

Information on all of the Honors Week programs is available at http://www.kent.edu/media/NewsReleases/2008HonorsWeek.cfm

For more information, contact Dr. James Blank at 330-672-3614 or jblank@kent.edu.

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