[MUSIC] Hello everyone. Welcome Karen, welcome Akil. Nice to, to meet you. So today we have a great chance, we have two brilliant researchers. One who's coming from MIT, so Karen, who's doing a research paper in the Management Research Center at the Polytechnique and studying our process of policy [FOREIGN] for PSC, so she will tell us about that. And Akil with brilliant former PhD student so, so PhD and post doc from Polytechnic and now in the process of becoming a professor in the coming months I think. He's an specialist of innovation in countries like India and innovating the systems like, water, or designing water systems electricity networks, and also mobility systems. Working with, car manufacturers, with big companies French for example. [MUSIC] >> As you mentioned, I am here at CRJ in Polytechnique. Just out of a master's degree at MIT where I studied Urban Planning, but prior to that I actually was a journalist and so, I spent a few years writing about communities, cities and also covering innovation and technology culture. >> Mm-hm. >> And so, and that just gives you a little bit of background as to what brought me here. During my time in Boston, I focused a lot on innovation ecosystems and so, I came here to CRJ interested in learning more about what's happening in Paris, greater Paris and within the ecosystem here. >> Mm, thank you very much. >> So, Akil [INAUDIBLE]. >> Sure. Yeah I'm working on water and electricity issues in developing cities especially in India. >> Mm-hm. >> And that brought me work with Karen here that is working in lab with me. On how students can help better frame technologies and how to harness their knowledge, so that we can improve the situation of public services. >> Mm-hm. >> Like water, electricity, provisions, interlocking cities like such as in India. And I'm I'm willing to engage into a research that deals with how to have on one side you have big companies bringing their services in the cities, you know, with very heavy infrastructure and on the other side. >> Mm-hm. >> You can have also a, a different model that deals with lighter technologies like information and communication- >> Mm-hm. >> Technologies so that we fill the gap that is missing, you know, when you don't have enough water or electricity. How we can improve that situation bringing into the picture- >> So you do not change the, the one network, you, you use the network, existing one, consider it that you, it may last ten or 15 or 20 years to change it. So in the meantime, you want to introduce new technologies to, to improve it. >> True, true. Knowing that infrastructure situation won't change that quickly within the five, ten, 15 years- >> Mm-hm. >> Of that context. So that you need to bring these destructive technologies that are lighter sometime, like inform, Information and communication technology. Waiting for that improvement of having infrastructure. >> Mm. And you're also interested in that student component and thinking about academics and how that can fit in. >> Sure so right thinking about how we can harvest the best knowledge, the scientific knowledge. >> Mm-hm. >> Of places, places like, like here and to make that knowledge available to the general public, first, before the general public to, to some companies, for example, whatever the size of the companies are. >> Hm. >> So that later on, the general public can benefit from that knowledge through the nexus of technology is very easy. Technology or services. [MUSIC] >> So Akil, you told us about the big challenges that you see for innovating in the network systems, utilities in countries like India or others. You told us about also the, very interesting skills which exist in in campuses like here in our Saclay valley, there is the Univerité Paris Saclay In which there are both hard science, social sciences etc... which can be, you told useful or used in a responsible way for this big challenges in India. So please tell us a bit more about that. >> Sure, so to be very practical for example daily users of public water supply- >> Mm-hm. >> Service in Indian City, hardly get two hours of water per day. For electricity the situation is far better. During rainy seasons or heavy summers. >> Mm-hm. >> Sometime they have shortages of electricity once once a day or once a week. And here, back to France, we have in this plateau that is University of Paris Saclay, the opportunity to harness the knowledge and the skills of both researches and students that have skills, technical skills and also managerial skills. And this is our point, how to harness the best of their skills, to assemble them, so that slowly we can come to solutions. >> Mm-hm. >> That can be some of them disruptive for this developing cities. [MUSIC] >> Karen, you, you came so we had the chance to, to have come from MIT to, to study and to make some research about a system we have at Ecole polytechnique: collective scientific project. We, we try to, to improve the ability of our students to connect to researchers. >> Mm. >> And to engage in, in what we call responsible science projects. So, tell us a bit about your observation and your feelings regarding this experience. >> Absolutely. So as Akil is pointing out, you know, this question of how, how do we take advantage of these resources that are here? We began our project and our research exploring that topic and focusing on the idea of resources in particular. And so we tapped into what seemed like the most obvious population for us, which was the PSC, the Projet Scientifique Collectif. >> Mm-hm. >> and, I think we're going to refer to it as CSP for English purposes, but, this group is a really amazing group that exists here at Polytechnique. And there are students like this throughout throughout the plateau and, you know, all of France obviously, but these students in particular are in their second year at Polytechnique. >> Mm. >> And PSC is a, or CSP is a year long collaborative scientific research project. And students pair up in teams of five to seven students and they identify a scientific problem that they would like to solve, and or, they can create a unique scientific demonstration, so a demo project that reflects some sort of research, scientific exploration. And so, we did in depth interviews with students, and because we were focused on this idea of resources we really probed them, asking not only how they were identifying their projects how they were finding advisors and how what tools they were using to frame the problem. But we also wanted to know, you know what were the barriers, what helped you and what didn't help you. And in the process of doing this we found some really just we, what we thought were key insights, things that just really stood out. And the first one was students within CSP are taking advantage of their networks of practice. And we identified this first and foremost as students reaching out to other students. >> Mm-hm. >> And this was often happening in very informal ways. Students meeting at parties. >> Mm-hm. >> Meeting at sports associations. Meeting friends of friends, very organically. The other network of practice that we observed with students reaching out formally to alumni. As you know here at Polytechnique, there is a very strong alumni association, but that's the case with any university. There are resources for students to reach out to other former students. The second really big point that we saw was the idea of proximity and its influence on the development of these projects. And, this builds off of some former work that, that, that I had done, but we, we notice that students were more successful when they were choosing topics that were close to home. So they were working on research projects that were on campus, that were 15 minutes away, perhaps at Danone >> Mm. >> Working at research labs there. Rather than going for an hour or two hours to different laboratories in various places. Also students were meeting in informal places. They were meeting in what we like to call third places. >> Mm-hm. >> Cafes, restaurants, things that were on campus that would sort of complement the research process. thirdly, we looked at gate keepers. >> Mm-hm. >> And people who were streaming the monetary resources available to students, and so students who had strong alliances with advisors and departments. Were much more likely to easily get funding when they needed it for hardware, for software, et cetera. And then finally, we looked at the role of advisors. And truly the importance of uh,these student scientific research teams identifying an advocate for them. Who would not only provide feedback on their work, and perhaps theoretical context, but also help nurture their projects through all of those administrative parts of doing the work. So I think that kind of sums up some of our big findings- >> Mm. >> Around the topic of resources, but is there anything that you think, comes out? >> I, I, I think it's, we have to be honest as well because plateau is the university of Saccly's ongoing project. >> Yeah >> It's a mason project. So, there is also. >> So it's not, Silicon Saclay is not already at parity with silicon valley but it's it's our idea. >> Totally, totally. So there is also, and Karen told us about that because there is all, you know, to, to, to be a place where things are happening you also need to consider the urban setting. >> Mm-hm. >> You know, she mentioned places, social places like cafe, and so on, which is not already existing, right? >> Yep, uh-huh. >> And, it's, it's, it will be a process that will happen. By the way, all these facilities and amenities would come along so that students feel like staying here, working here, interacting here, with start ups, entrepreneurs you know, having appointment in that social places. So that this this, this, this emergence happened. >> Mm. >> Emergence of ideas, of projects along with scientific knowledge, which is already existing. I mean, which is the hard stuff. >> Mm, very strongly, strong assets. >> And this the our, our strength. >> Thank you. [MUSIC] Okay guys, so we have now to bring some, some conclusive remarks, and suggestions for the researchers and the young students who are in, in campuses around the world and while questioning themselves what, what's the sense of of my research. How can it be informative would say? How can I have an impact? Should I create a start up? So, if you have some final remarks and suggestions for these researcher students, if interested. >> Absolutely, yeah. I think we have a few things that we love to share. So, just to recap again we had introduced from our research this idea of these four types of resources that. >> Mm-hm. >> Students can take advantage of when building out new ventures or start-up ideas from a research base. And, you know, first one was networks of practice or taking advantage of informal and formal networks, students alumni associations et cetera. The second thing being physical access gate keepers and then the role of the advisor and the mentor. And so, I'll just respond with a few recommendations- >> Mm-hm. >> That can fit within that those categories. The first one looking at networks of practice being you know, students learning from other students. Based on my own experiences having done action learning at MIT and it's SLOAN, the management school there. Students often gave critical feedback of the work of their peers and that was something that we didn't see happening with the PSC and so an opportunity to do that would be great. The second thing being proximity. Again, we had talked about physical access. >> Mm-hm. >> And one thing that we think could be really interesting and a great opportunity, would be to create more co-working and incubator spaces within the plateau for students specifically. And we've heard that that could be on the horizon, perhaps. So, I'm definitely looking forward to that. The second, or, excuse me, the third thing looking at this idea of financial gatekeepers and the importance of funding, and so, the students that we spoke to had to ask in a very adhoc fashion for funding, as they needed it. And so we took a look at the landscape of student start up projects around the world. And we're noticing a trend where there are competitions being put in place. Big idea competitions and attached with these competitions can be monetary prizes of little as I mean a thousand euros to a hundred thousand euros, depending on the scale at which that's working. And then another gate keeper barrier that we saw was students struggling with understanding intellectual property, rules and regulations on campus. And so anything that can be done to really be upfront with students and to let them understand, you know, what work is their work? What work is the property of the university? >> Mm. >> Or their collaborators? And just being very transparent about that. And then finally we you know, look at this idea of mentorship and feedback, and just really being clear that it's so important to get critical feedback of any start up idea or new venture idea. Not being so protective of an idea that you're not learning if it's good or bad and so, those are just a few small things to, to get the thoughts going. >> Thank you very much. Really enriching. >> True. On the other dance I hear it's towards researchers and also students. I would say it's useful to have an eye on what's happening elsewhere from a very concrete point of view. Let's say, when we do field surveys in these developing countries and cities observing how with house end users for example for these very essential service, water, electricity, transport as well. do, with very few means and limited resource, they make the best use of that utilities not only with the, I would say, the public infrastructure they have but also the very inventive solutions they produce by themselves alternative. options. So for we researchers it's very meaningful to look into details, how they mobilize these services, resources how they use that. So that it might help us to understand here in campuses, how students can improve these alternative options and users already using in developing countries. >> Mm-hm. >> So we add a value to that existing setting. >> Thank you very much, it was very rich to have this discussion and to see also that every people in the innovative campuses have a, a role to play to improve innovation process the global innovation process we can have. So, students doing research creating startups, or so researches helping them to, to do that next door or at the on the other part of the world, so it's a very enriching and increasing perspective that you have brought us, so thank you very much. >> Thank you for having us. [MUSIC]
