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The New York Academy of Sciences has long been an international organization, with a reach well beyond its New York City base. Today, approximately 40% of its members live outside the United States, in more than 140 countries. Science itself has never been more global; its success depends on international collaborations and cooperation. With this observation as a guiding principle, the Academy has inaugurated the Scientists Without BordersSM program. The venture aims to address health and other problems in the developing world by bringing together scientists from disparate specialties, organizations, and locations.
Learn more about Scientists Without BordersSM
• Go to the Scientists Without Borders Web site.
• Read about its conception.
• Make a contribution.
• Read the press release.
A new approach to sharing scientific expertise
The scientific community has tremendous potential for promoting global health, agricultural progress, environmental well-being, energy needs, and other pressing issues, yet it lacks an institution that can play an overarching role in mobilizing its members and organizations for these benefits. Such an institution is needed now more than ever, with the growing realization that integrated rather than narrow approaches are crucial for addressing key challenges such as extreme poverty and the glaring health problems that accompany it. Guided by the UN Millennium Development Goals and in collaboration with a broad network of institutions and individuals in the developing and the developed world, the Academy is creating such a body. Although we are building and hosting the initiative, we envision it as a community venture; participation and a sense of joint ownership will be key components of the endeavor. Under the Scientists Without BordersSM umbrella, organizations and people can come together in new ways to deliver an impact that they could not have achieved independently.
As a first step, Scientists Without BordersSM is focusing on four under-addressed opportunities:
• | Aligning Organizational Initiatives With One Another
Often, capacity-building efforts take place in close physical proximity to one another, but without meaningful contact. As a result, these endeavors attempt to address key problems in isolation when advice, essential resources, and complementary endeavors are just around the corner. Furthermore, many worthwhile enterprises are fueled by superb but focused areas of expertise. These endeavors would amplify their power by joining forces with those of others that have a different set of strengths.
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Aligning Individuals With Organizations
Many members of the scientific community, especially young and retired investigators, would readily give of themselves to help meet seminal challenges of our time. These individuals include academic and industry scientists who could address the causes of hunger, non-potable water, environmental degradation, disease transmission, and poor access to energy sources; many might also train students and professors in developing countries. But despite the significant resources available—and the unprecedented wave of volunteerism sweeping the scientific community—there is no easy way for interested individuals to survey the hundreds of ongoing projects that might need their skills, much less to join such projects or to link to developing world institutions that would benefit from their capabilities.
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Aligning Needs With Resources
Developing world institutions and individual researchers do not have a system in which to register their needs. Furthermore, because no centralized repository consolidates information about capacity-building work in the developing world, service organizations and funding agencies risk performing redundant activities.
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Aligning Past and Future Projects
Currently, no mechanism exists to ensure continuity among projects in the developing world. Organization and project leaders often do not know about previous achievements—or barriers to further progress. As a result, "reinvention of the wheel" is a common problem and new activities do not necessarily maintain and bolster existing accomplishments or pick up where old work left off.
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Addressing the challenge
The potential to enhance effectiveness by sharing information and integrating activities is enormous. These needs lie at the core of Scientists Without BordersSM, an endeavor born of a collaboration between the Academy and the UN Millennium Project. The initiative is a global alliance of leading NGOs, public/private partnerships, scientific academies, universities, foundations, and companies—many of which individually perform heroic acts but rarely work in concert to inspire and empower academic and industry investigators to operate synergistically.
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In May 2008, Scientists Without BordersSM launched its first project, a Web portal, whose cornerstone is a database that will: |
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Connect scores of public and private organizations that are currently addressing the UN Millennium Development Goals through science-based activities—and foster innovative activities among them;
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Offer a unique and empowering information source to thousands of academic and industry scientists who wish to work on global health, environmental challenges and other vital issues; |
• | Register needs and available resources, thus allowing scientists and organizations to connect and direct their energies for maximum impact; and |
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Provide a mechanism by which organizations can build on one another's progress.
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This user-friendly and easily accessible tool assembles information about the location, goals, needs, and other attributes of research-based and capacity-building projects, as well as a roster of scientists who are willing to help.
The resulting resource will foster connections among organizations working in the same region or on related problems, and it will allow scientists prepared to offer time and expertise to browse opportunities and advertise their capacities. They can be matched according to their area of knowledge and/or in a need-based manner.
Please go to Scientists Without BordersSM now, and register information about yourself, your project, or your organization in the database now. The Web portal, which is co-branded with all partner institutions, is also building a library of educational components as well as community-building tools. Future Scientists Without BordersSM projects are under consideration.
Scientists Without BordersSM was formally launched at the Academy's 2006 Science & the City Gala.
How you can help
Corporate Sponsorship
Many prominent corporations have already pledged their support to Scientists Without BordersSM. For more information about how your company can become involved, contact René Bastón, Vice President, Business Development, at 212.298.8674 or rbaston@nyas.org.
• For a current list of corporate supporters, click here.
Partner with Scientists Without BordersSM
Scientists Without BordersSM is building a global network of organizations engaged in science-based initiatives to aid the developing world. For more information about how you can become a partner in our mission, contact Evelyn Strauss, Executive Director, at estrauss@nyas.org.
• For a current list of our partner organizations, click here.
Donate to Scientists Without BordersSM
As an individual you can also help Scientists Without BordersSM mobilize the scientific community to address challenges in the developing world. To support this project now, click on a specific dollar amount below, or enter another amount and click submit. Thank you!
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