Cultural Change and Social Equity as Drivers for Convergent Research in Water and Material Circularity

A growing global population and limited resources require society to move towards a circular economy. Resources must be conserved and reused more effectively, with wastes upcycled into products of value and clean energy. Past investments in new technologies to increase the circular use of resources have fallen short, however, failing to consider cultural perspectives and economic and policy frameworks that are critical to success.

New approaches are needed in which engineers and scientists understand and incorporate multiple stakeholder values into their work and confront the role of non-technological factors in advancing circularity. Policymakers also need to understand and incorporate multiple stakeholder values as they develop and then apply science-based approaches that recognize technological constraints.

This NSF Research Traineeship project will address these needs by training master’s and doctoral students in the circular use of water and materials in the context of different cultural perspectives, real-world experiences, and academic research. The traineeship anticipates providing unique training opportunities to approximately 300 students, including twenty (20) directly funded trainees and forty (40) trainees that will participate in all aspects of the program with funding from other sources.

This training program will benefit society by leading to new technologies, policy and economic instruments, methods, and implementation strategies for the circular use of resources. Trainees will span fields of engineering, science, public affairs, urban planning, and environmental policy.

This project will integrate policy, engineering, and science with a combination of coursework, cutting-edge interdisciplinary research, and internships. Additionally, community interactions led by an Artist-in-Residence are designed to enhance the trainees’ identity and capacity for positive societal impact. Trainees will participate in several key activities.

First is cohort-focused coursework on circularity as a system, as well training to: cultivate essential leadership and professional skills, foster interdisciplinary collaboration, and promote engaged scholarship on circularity. A second component consists of interdisciplinary graduate research experiences focused on creating circular solutions to currently unsustainable water, energy, and material use.

A third aspect is comprised of external internships that build from research projects and/or community engagement and are incorporated directly into the trainee’s thesis or dissertation. Finally, a fourth and novel component of this traineeship will take the form of structured engagements with the community throughout the program led by an embedded Artist-in-Residence.

These interactions will result in the cultivation of creative models of self-reflection, collaboration, and social engagement, along with the exploration of each trainee’s impact identity, defined as the potential of one’s work to bring about positive societal impact as seen through personal, communal, and professional aspects of an individual’s practice and interests. These trainees represent a new generation of sustainability and circularity professionals that will serve as connectors between researchers, industry, and communities.

This integrated research and education traineeship will result in the creation of a new certificate program and increased interactions with the community and industries.

The NSF Research Traineeship (NRT) Program is designed to encourage the development and implementation of bold, new potentially transformative models for STEM graduate education training. The program is dedicated to effective training of STEM graduate students in high priority interdisciplinary or convergent research areas through comprehensive traineeship models that are innovative, evidence-based, and aligned with changing workforce and research needs.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.