Document Type

Report

Journal/Book Title/Conference

Utah Water Research Laboratory: Selected Papers and Presentations

Publication Date

5-1979

First Page

1

Last Page

83

Abstract

For years, the cooperative water resources research program of the Office of Water Research and Technology and the water resources research institutes in the respective states has been experiencing considerable difficulty in generating agency, congressional, and user support of a sort that attracts sufficient funding to maintain a dynamic research program. Efforts to increase support have included recruiting greater interaction with research user groups, expansion of the technology transfer program, cultivation of interaction of center directors and research users with congress, shifting requests for added funding within the research program from the allotment funding given the respective states to matching grant and federally funded projects focusing on national priorities, and integrating the OWRT effort into a coordinated five-year research and development program. The results have improved the program and increased user support, but funding difficulties continue unabated. The highlight of the 1979 Annual NAWID meeting was Bill Walker's presentation of the pr6blem and plea to all to get together and solve it. The problem and its solution have been subjected to considerable debate for the last few years within both NAWID and OWRT. Each time, the effort to build a strong case has been forced into the corner of recognizing that OWRT files simply do not contain sufficient documentation to present program achievements. The series of papers, committee reports, and summaries of workshop deliberations reproduced here for ready reference in the continuing effort to improve documentation of program effectiveness argue toward a concept of documentation that d~parts significantly from the emphasis in the efforts to increase support referenced in the previous paragraph. The concept here is to document program content and application rather than to work for improvement through refinement of program administration. The new thrust would demonstrate research achievements with carefully prepared sets of research results that develop and maintain for each technical topic coming within the scope of the total OWRT program, a running summary of the current state of knowledge and of how it is being applied in problem solving. The running documentation would provide bases for 1) judging new proposals, 2) judging the contribution of completed research, 3) identifying OWRT contribution to the total state of the art, 4) abstracting technical knowhow for solving user problems and technology transfer and information dissemination programs, and 5) preparing testimony and answering questions in program presentations.

Comments

This work made publicly available electronically on May 21, 2012.

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