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TCNJ-Industry Partnerships Guidelines

General Guidelines for TCNJ-Industry Partnerships (PDF link)

 

The College of New Jersey

General Guidelines for TCNJ-Industry Partnerships

February 2015

Purpose and Goals

The overarching purpose for developing industry partnerships is to enhance and intensify the College’s mission-related learning experiences, with special focus on the Signature Experiences, while enhancing its relevance and engagement in the community and expanding revenue sources to support the goals of the partnerships. The schools, departments, and other units of the College that pursue industrial partnerships are directed by the following three goals.

The first goal is to enhance the College’s mission by increasing educational opportunities for students in a variety of fields to engage in high impact approaches and solutions to issues. Students who participate in these opportunities develop profound insights and understandings about the world and their role in it.

The second goal is to expand and enhance the College’s role in the broader community through synergistic interactions with our industrial partners that could not readily be done by the College or the company alone.

The third goal is to bring additional revenue to the College that directly supports student learning experiences, thereby reducing the College’s and the student’s financial burden in developing and implementing these unique education benefits, student participation, and faculty mentorships.

Guiding Principles

  1. TCNJ interacts with industry partners based on these understandings: (a) that TCNJ is a strategic partner for industry, particularly companies interested in applying professional faculty expertise and unbiased analysis to their products, outcomes, services, or systems; and (b) that industry interaction can provide powerful, deeply engaging educational experiences that enhance the students’ ability to become productive professionals.
  2. TCNJ partners with companies that wish to join with the educational mission and Teacher/Scholar model of the College by working directly with faculty and often with students while gaining specific project-based outcomes. The College develops interactions with industry partners who share our passion for preparing the next generation of professionals.
  3. Consistent with the College’s educational mission, there is the opportunity for companies to retain or share in new intellectual property licenses developed during the course of the project. The College carefully develops industry interactions so that proper incentives exist for all constituents including the company, faculty members, students, and the College.
  4. Reflecting TCNJ’s educational and scholarly mission, industry partnership agreements are designed to support the College’s dedication to free inquiry and open exchange by eschewing publication limitations, while also striving to protect ownership of data and intellectual property rights developed as a result of or otherwise related to a project.
  5. TCNJ creates an environment that supports and encourages participation in the partnership experience by faculty, students, and individuals within our partner organizations.
  6. Recognizing that industry partner experiences enhance the students’ ability to become productive professionals, members of the TCNJ community and industry partners who are involved in these experiences are expected to model their respective codes of conduct.

Operating Principles

  1. TCNJ-industry interactions will be formalized by a contract-based agreement between the College and the company with faculty members serving as the primary liaison to the company, responsible for working with the company to create the scope, budget, and timeline of the project as well as recruiting and managing the student(s). The College will maintain template contracts and other legal documents that will help facilitate the initiation of such interactions.
  2. The College may enter into third party grants in partnership with the company, for example, SBIR or STTR offered through many federal agencies.
  3. There are various interface mechanisms that the faculty member may use to develop and complete the project including:
    1. working with students in an internship experience (paid or unpaid),
    2. working with students as part of the summer research program,
    3. working with students on research, design, scholarly, or artistic projects (e.g. capstone or other credit bearing experiences), and/or
    4. working with students in her or his laboratory.
  4. All guidelines and supporting documents need to be as clear and understandable to all parties as possible to achieve the goal of increased industry interactions.
  5. Incentives need to be in place and clearly articulated for industry participants, students, faculty members, and the College.
  6. In some cases, students and faculty may not be able to use the College-supplied versions of specific software applications for industry-sponsored projects. Educational software licenses need to be respected. Strategic investments may need to be made in critical software packages needed to support certain projects.
  7. Similarly, in some cases, students and faculty may not be able to use College-supplied informational databases (including but not limited to online journal subscriptions) for industry-sponsored projects, since the use of these databases is licensed only for non-commercial educational purposes. Strategic investments may need to be made in critical online resources needed to support certain projects.
  8. Thorough and effective planning of an industrial partnership project is essential to the success of the project and must include sufficient time, inquiry, and communication to ensure that all academic, research, fiscal, legal, and administrative support aspects of the project are carefully considered and addressed.

Approved: Provost February 3, 2015

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