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IEEE SC Image

IEEE Sensors Council New Initiatives Program

Aim

IEEE Sensors Council invites innovative funding applications for New Initiatives (NIs) aligned with the Council’s goals and interests, as well as being in line with IEEE’s motto of Advancing Technology for Humanity. The New Initiative Committee is responsible for evaluation, recommendation and monitoring of the NI programs.

Overview of New Initiatives Program

Historically we started soliciting proposals from 2019. So far we have approved funding of over $2M in these 5 years. Majority of them (funding-wise) were in 2023, our 25 Year Anniversary Year.

New Initiatives Committee

Composition

  • The Chair of the New Initiatives Committee is the President-Elect
  • Two Vice Presidents of Sensors Council selected by Chair
  • Two Senior Members-at-Large appointed by Chair for one year
  • Two Members-at-Large appointed by Chair for one year

Term of Office

  • The Chair will serve for two years.
  • The Committee Members will serve for the duration of one year renewable for one more term.

What we invite

Programs, products, or services that promise

  • significant benefit to the sensors community
  • to have lasting impact on the Council and its business processes
  • alignment with our strategic planning
  • scalability.

Some of the suggested areas for 2025 are:

  • 25 Years of SENSORS conference
  • Making and Shaping of Sensors Council (documentation from historical perspective)
  • Megatrends in Sensors and Sensing Technologies
  • Podcasts
  • Sensors StudyTube
  • TrySensors (ChatGPT/AskIEEE type platform)
  • Connecting with local community (technical content in local languages using AI)
  • Multilingual Captioning/subtitle for the videos posted on our YouTube channel

What we accept

The types of NI projects having high priority for the SC include:

  • Increasing SC’s engagement with industry
  • Actions which benefit SC journal and conference publications
  • Innovative educational opportunities in sensors (but not seasonal schools, workshops, seminars, training courses, etc.)
  • Activities which enhance the delegate experience and knowledge exchange at SC conferences, but which are not part of the operational budget of the conference
  • Innovative actions to increase visibility of SC activities and strengthen communication with SC’s community

What we reject

The SC NI program has strong similarities to the IEEE NI program and does not fund the types of activities listed here. For example, following types of proposals won't be supported:

  • Individual research and development projects, including prototypes and testing products
  • Seasonal schools, workshops, seminars, training courses, etc.
  • Venture capital for patentable inventions
  • Overhead (general and administrative or indirect costs)
  • Ongoing activities or operational costs of the applicant
  • Commercial promotion activities
  • Grants with an individual as the sole beneficiary
  • Scholarships to individuals or institutes
  • Endowments
  • Participation of specific/individual teams at competitions or conferences
  • Extensive travel and meeting expenses

Submission for New Initiatives Program Funding

Starting 2024:

  • You may submit the proposal anytime during the year by filling up this online form (won’t take more than 15 min, if you have everything ready).
  • The NI Committee meets to decide on those newly submitted proposals 4 times a year (each Q).

Important Note:

  • The budget cycle is on a calendar year basis, therefore projects face an end–of–year hard stop on funding (we keep it 7 Dec of each year)
  • To ensure freedom to the initiative leader, we allow them to propose the start date of their initiative, which includes release of funding.

For example: if your proposal is approved on 15 Sep 2024, you may request for 1 Jan 2025 as the start date of your initiative.

Major NI Funded Initiatives, 2020-2025

  • Upgrading the process of voice-over-ppt presentation capture system (resulted into a library of over 2500 videos on our YouTube Channel)
  • "IEEE Sensors Alert" - an online monthly magazine
  • Chapter Engagement (resulted into our presence in all 10 Regions and an excellent growth of our chapters worldwide)
  • Journal-Conference Synergy Initiative (resulted into an increase in our conference participation and submission to our journal, IEEE Sensors Letters)
  • Targeted Online Publicity (Digital Marketing Expansion resulted into our visibility on social media platforms and participation in our conferences)
  • Engagement of SC chapters to educate MEMS sensors researchers and industry personnel on MEMS Multi Process Wafer Runs (resulted into cluster formation which will ultimately evolve into Technical Committees)
  • Educational Activity around our developed sensors awareness kit "MYOSA" (a boost in our educational activities visibility through our conferences)
     
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