Power in Partnership Interview
Research Administration organizations operate on a range of scales and work to accommodate a variety of conditions and missions. Developing Vandalizer, an integrated suite of AI tools flexible to these varied conditions, has been a collaborative task––one that has called for diverse perspectives and insights into the different institutional contexts in which RA offices operate.
This collaborative effort began with a partnership formed between the University of Idaho (a Carnegie R1 Research Institution) and Southern Utah University (a Predominantly Undergraduate Institution). In this interview, Jason Cahoon, one of our editors for AI Trailblazer, discusses this partnership with Sarah Martonick and Sylvia Bradshaw, two of our Principal Investigators on the AI4RA project, and the Directors of Sponsored Programs at University of Idaho and Southern Utah respectively. They discuss how the RA offices at the University of Idaho and Southern Utah University came to share a vision for democratizing access to AI tools for all RA organizations, the partnership that they formed in pursuit of this mission, and the value of drawing from diverse institutional perspectives when designing reliable AI tools. Martonick and Bradshaw offer firsthand insights on how the collaborative effort between their respective offices has informed the design of Vandalizer, the suite of AI tools designed specifically for RA.
In this post, we offer a video of the full, 40-minute interview along with a complete transcript. We invite you to share your questions and ideas in the comments section at the bottom of this page. Thank you for engaging with our content. Your participation is a key aspect of the collaborative spirit underlying the AI4RA initiative.
(Editor’s note: in this interview, we discuss our goal to open access to Vandalizers for those outside of the University of Idaho and Southern Utah University. Since recording this interview, we have made considerable progress on this aim, creating access to those in our community of practice. To learn more about how you can access Vandalizer, go to https://vandalizer.uidaho.edu/, check out the most recent newsletter on our website at https://ai4ra.uidaho.edu/, or contact us using our contact page at https://ai4ra.uidaho.edu/contact/)