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MIT Media Lab Tightens Its Belt
Forbes Magazine has this story about the MIT Media Laboratory's current "burn rate" problem. It seems that the Media Lab is feeling the same big draft at its posterior that dot-com companies felt last year after years of go-go growth and seemingly unlimited funding. The Media Lab is particularly sensitive to this downturn due to its heavy reliance on corporate sponsorship, as well as its fondness for unconventional, even eccentric, research. Items that will no longer receive funding according to a January 5th internal E-mail from the Lab's Executive Director Walter Bender: cellular telephones, first-class air travel, food at internal Lab meetings, and furniture. Other more serious cutbacks for the Lab include layoffs for 29 staff members and reduced funding for students, including salaries for "Undergraduate Research Opportunities" (UROP) positions. The Media Lab had previously paid such positions $8.75 and up in order to remain competitive with industry offers that even not-yet-graduated students were receiving.
$8.75 per hour huh? To some of the brightest minds in the world? I say cut the stupid first class travel, cut the nice office equipment, but save that salary. These "kids" are cutting edge innovators.
Imagine if something like this had happened to the folks at Bell Labs? Even with all the layoffs Lucent had, business there went on pretty much as usual. Throughout history, the true innovators were rewarded for their knowledge, not penalized for something they didn't really have anything to do with. Poor spending is poor spending, but save the salaries...
I expect to hear from people on my innovators of history part, but bear in mind I said most....
thanks
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The recent layoffs and cutbacks were spurred by the discovery that the Media Lab didn't have $6 or $7 million in the coffers, but were rather that much in the red.
Let me say that again: instead of a surplus of several million US dollars, they had a similar deficit. I can't fathom how anyone keeping the books -- even the most incompetent of accountants -- could make such a mistake. But it was made, and it's what sparked this whole trimming-of-the-fat. Worst bit is that some regular employees (not grad students, not UROPs) are having their hours cut, while the UROPs -- many of whom do nothing but sit on their asses all day long -- can work full weeks.
Let's hope some generous sponsor(s) will cough up the cash to get them back on track and not disrupt their research too much.
give me a break. these students who work at the media lab could make quite a bit more than $8.75 an hour in pretty much any field in existance. MIT pays a minimum wage on campus of $8 for undergrads. i suspect that this is the 'industry' that they are trying to remain competitive with.
but, then again, there is little chance that these students are there to cash in on the huge salary. i am currently an undergraduate assistant for a january class at mit (2.670) where students make a working stirling engine, and learn enough solidworks to make a working assembly of the engine. i could easily spend this time during january and work a real job solid modelling and make at least 5 times the amount.
but i like teaching. its not about the money.
The Media Lab still has a place, but it may, during the economic downturn, see itself overshadowed by more concrete research--by tangible products like drugs.
Pass the bowl, I need to do some "tangible research"...
I'm a 2000 man.
It finally all makes sense. Media Lab set up a "European Branch" in Dublin about a year ago, for which they got about 50 million IRP (approx) $60 million, which was allocated from the indigenous research funds supposedly reserved for research activities in Irish Universities (not the most affluent at the best of times, but still producing solid results). The initial payment was not exclusively for the Dublin site, rather a large chunk was redirected back to Media Lab in Mass., supposedly it represented a "payment" from the Irish people so that Irish students we could have the privelege of access to Media Lab's IP. To the best of my knowledge, the number of students in the Dublin institution, a year after its establishment, can be counted on the fingers of one hand. Oh yeah, I almost forgot that they managed to get a clause agreed on that a significant percentage of all funds donated to "Media Lab Europe", i.e. the Dublin based institution, would be redirected back to Media Lab in Mass. We're suckers.
Meejalab
$5M in sponsorship for the "smart potholder"? Screw that. Throw some funding at the the "silent jackhammer."
Many people think that it's a typo...it's not. The MIT Minimum Wage is basically ~$8/hr...Meida Lab UROPs got paid a little more base starting salary. Hardly the small fortune the article makes it out to be, considering how much most could've gotten paid locally at some dotcom (esp., during the height of the boom).
Also, as a former Media Lab UROP, I can strongly state that the UROPs in the Media Lab were the BACKBONE of work in the Media Lab. Another misconception from the article is that they UROPs had "projects" that they circulate looking for funding that the Media Lab would fund. Couldn't be more wrong. The UROPs are/were more like contract programming labor hired to support/flesh out the theories of the grad. students/professors. Cutting such is going to be the hardest cut to make...
It's tragic that a significant portion of the private sector takes this kind of a stance. The Media Lab, in it's day, was a unique place where sometimes extremely disparate companies were able to work together, share ideas, and advance not only their businesses, but technology in a much more significant way than they would have separately.
What happens when Intel sits down with Lego and some creative, bright students? Lego gets Mindstorms... Intel gets an entirely new product line. This was the place where corporate R&D hit the academic cutting edge. It brought you HDTV, Mindstorms, Electronic Ink (which is turning very quickly into printable transistors). It's working on building automation with cooperation from both appliance companies and building companies. MEMS, Education, Agents, News Delivery... Hell, students there even had a part in remeasuring Mt. Everest. Worthless indeed.
As for "frivolous perks," the professors at the lab get paid academic salaries. Many of them, who consult with their sponsors as a condition of their sponsorship contracts, travel 150-200k miles /year. Have you tried logging that much travel in coach, without a cell phone?
Yes, there are significant parts of the Media Lab designed to make it "plush" for both sponsors and researchers, but you don't attract some of the brightest and most creative people on the planet by giving them a cinder block office $5.25 an hour.
Like nomadic, who replied above, I also suffered through a public university. In my case, the computer science program was barely able to afford the basics. This is in Minnesota, USA which is one of the most highly taxed regions of the country and yet, we could barely afford the basics. I paid my own tuition, I paid for my own meals, I paid my own room and board, and I worked the $4.25/hour jobs to do it. I emerged from school with much less debt than my coastal peers and, for the most part, with much more willingness to bust my ass to succeed.
To me, that is valuable. Having a role in remeasuring Mt. Everst, Legos products, and other commercial innovations is interesting to be sure. However, if we don't afford our students a bit of hardship, then how are they to have enough character to make real contributions to the world and not just invent the next profit margin gimmick? MIT may have done some important things in the past (and are probably doing so right now in some ways), but it didn't do those because they had every convenience and plush toy available to them. Why should that be the case now? If I provide all those extras, who am I going to attract? Will I attract those with an interest in being among the elite? Or will I attract those with an interest in being merely comfortable? If I simply provide an education with a reputation for producing lean and mean technologists, who will I attract? I will attract those who are motivated to become better.
As for professors, I do not begrudge any professor their salary. They put up with way too much for the likes of me to badmouth them. But there's a limit there too.
Excessive comfort does not promote real innovation.
Please mod this post only if you think others should/n't read this. I have enough ego^H^H^Hkarma. Thanks!