Scholars Strategy Network (SSN)

Scholars Strategy Network (SSN) Overview

• SSN is a fast-growing network that helps academics gain public influence.
• As of 2014, SSN has enrolled over 470 scholars from various disciplines across more than 140 colleges and universities.
• The network's overall goal is to get scholars to reach beyond academia to improve public policy and enhance democracy.

SSN Structure and Activities

• Issue-oriented groups within SSN tackle major national challenges, such as voting rights and health reform implementation.
• SSN supports 19 regional chapters that operate independently in states and metropolitan areas.
• Members present research findings in concisely written two-page briefs.
• SSN staff and volunteer leaders connect members and their research to journalists, bloggers, policymakers, and advocacy groups.

SSN's Ideological Stance and Member Engagement

• SSN is not aligned with any ideology, political party, or candidate.
• Members have diverse views and make individual decisions about civic engagement.
• All members share the belief that scholars should reach beyond academia.

Addressing the Disconnect Between Academia and Public Discourse

• The organization recognizes the disconnection between university scholarship and public discussions, which prompts new interest in OpEd workshops by academics.
• University administrators are encouraging more public outreach, and discussions are being held on how scholars can reach policymakers.
• The SSN is attempting to reinvent public intellectual engagement, because ivory tower walls are already being breached by publicly-engaged scholars.

Digital Communication and Academic Outreach

• Digital communication enables academic efforts through professor blogs and discipline-based blogs like The Monkey Cage.
• University centers are also using electronic means to get research into the public realm.
• SSN enables university-based researchers to engage with policymakers, journalists/bloggers, and citizen/advocacy groups.
• The SSN website features research briefs, news, and spotlights on individual scholars.

SSN's Operational Strategy

• Aims to meld longstanding American forms of federated civic voluntarism with the latest tools for media and government/civic engagement.
• SSN has nearly 500 scholar-members, from graduate students to university professors in all fields.
• Energy comes from members and from leaders who direct regional chapters and issue-focused working groups.
• The national steering committee includes the director and philanthropic supporters.

Response to Criticism and Self-Expansion

• Responded to Nicholas Kristof's piece acknowledging the need for academics to engage in public discourse.
• The organization is designed for self-expansion through voluntary member initiatives.
• SSN scholars recruit new members, and volunteer academic leaders mount public endeavors suited to their research interests, civic concerns, and collaboration opportunities.

Development and Strategy Evolution

• SSN's initial attempts needed crucial improvements.
• By 2009, a dozen scholars from social science disciplines discussed getting academics more involved in public life.
• The scholars wanted to discuss democratic support for good policy ideas and improving how government and democracy work

Addressing the Decay of Public Life Connections

• Public life connections to universities have decayed as much as physical counterparts.
• Washington, DC, has become a self-enclosed world of lobbyists, think tanks, and advocacy groups with technical language incomprehensible to outsiders.
• Important public work is done in the states, shaped by regional media and citizen groups, but many university people are not involved.
• The US academia has turned inward

Overcoming Institutional Barriers

• SSN was created to combat the inward turn of US academia since WWII and push back against the current institutional situation.
• Aims to engage the values, research, and voluntary creative energy of university employees.
• It does not intend to set up a think tank operation.
• Determined to include scholars from disciplines/specialties at all career stages working in colleges/universities.
• Intends to address journalists/policymakers/associations like the League of Women Voters and organize chapters in various states/regions.
• SSN aimed to be a federation and nationwide individual membership association.

SSN's Organizational Model Evolution

• In its first incarnation (2009-2011), SSN urged regional leaders to set up groups of university scholars meeting regularly.
• It started paying scholars to write 5000-word pieces for public forums.
• Follow-up was not clear, and forums could be poorly timed which resulted in an updated model that was implemented by 2011.
• The new model entailed every member having tasks and husbanded resources being devoted to outreach and deployed by chapters and issue groups.

SSN's Current Structure and Objectives

• As of 2011, the focus shifted to recruiting members who would convey research results and ideas in everyday language.
• The Cambridge, Massachusetts, national office worked with Blue Coda to create a website for public audiences to access members and briefs.
• In early summer 2012, the Scholars Strategy Network launched and ramped up efforts to deploy contributions from members and chapters.

Overcoming Obstacles to University Academic Involvement

• SSN allows university-based scholars to leverage their work without diverting from it.
• It avoids partisanship, ideological orthodoxy, and over-specialization, providing flexibility for various civic engagement opportunities.
• SSN spreads skills for public engagement and empowers diverse groups of scholars by casting a wide net and supporting members at all ranks.

Maintaining Academic Integrity and Focus

• University-based scholars join SSN but need not depart from specialized academic research and publications.
• It helps members build on their work to reach broader audiences instead of asking them to divert their energies.
• Young scholars can focus on publishing for tenure, while academics can disseminate their work.
• SSN mobilizes commitment without competing with university day jobs.

Communication Mode and Member Contributions

• Communication mode is the two-page brief in everyday language, which is adaptable.
• Each scholar joins SSN by filling out a Member Profile and drafting an inaugural two-page brief.
• SSN edits the briefs into plain English without jargon or technical terms.
• Habits of procrastination are common, so SSN waits and asks until tasks are completed.
• Members prepare drafts thinking of how they would explain the research to a neighbor at Thanksgiving dinner, and SSN edits actively.
• Member contributions are usually "SSN Key Findings" briefs summing up main points from an underlying article, book, report, or conference paper.
• Other briefs include "SSN Basic Facts" and "SSN Civic Engagement," and they can be sole or co-authored.

Strategies for Growth and Influence

• Voluntary organizations grow best by activating social networks and urging participants to bring additional participants on board.
• SSN encourages member-to-member recruitment and spreads opportunities for leadership, initiative, and creativity.
• A national organization provides support for the organization of subnational chapters and other internal groups.
• Issue-focused working groups and regional networks allow voluntarily formed sets of members to address major public issues.

Addressing Civic Motivations and Non-Partisanship

• There are civic motivations able to be tapped into.
• SSN is a non-partisan and value-oriented voluntary association not aligned with particular candidates or political parties.
• There is no political orthodoxy and no need to agree upon political and policy positions.
• Members care about civic engagement in a progressive manner and the value that pioneers such as Jane Addams held.
• Individual members decide for themselves what public engagement means and take responsibility for signed writings and choices about civic activities.

Avoiding Issue Specialization

• SSN avoids issue specialization, which results in payoffs.
• It casts a wide net, recruiting scholars who work on everything from taxes and public budgets to women's issues and climate science.
• Members communicate findings from research about public opinion, social movements, and civic life, as well as about ideal policies in the abstract.
• Members produce research findings about government operations and the democratic political process.

SSN's Readiness

• The organization is ready with ideas, findings, and people no matter what topics appear on the public agenda.
• When the Aurora, Colorado, shootings happened, there were expert members who had done work on gun violence issues.
• When the Supreme Court took up affirmative action, there were leading experts ready to connect with journalists.
• Key is to build attention for topics not currently in the news and feature sets of scholars and research briefs that include historical and philosophical perspectives.

Multidisciplinary Outreach Efforts

• The common outreach effort is to create a website, group project, to draw upon from members and work from specialties.
• Combinations make outreach efforts more compelling.
• Every angle of analysis is available to journalists, advocates, and staffers in Congressional offices.
• Scholars need flexible ways to marshal and synthesize findings and ideas from various specialists quickly.

SSN's Impact and Structure

• The large range of contributions SSN has inspired is visible in the directory of briefs classified into eight major areas with subtopics.
• Profiles and briefs are on the website, which is set up to make it easy for everyone to search the offerings.
• SSN's 8 major ares are: The Economy and Public Budgets; Economic Security; Health Care; American Democracy; Society and Social Issues; Education; Environment and Energy; and America and the World.

SSN's Identity and Focus

• It is not like a think tank or specialized research institute.
• The organization is eclectic across policy areas and areas of social and political relevance.
• SSN includes moral theorists and historians as well as economists, medical researchers, and statistical analysts.
• Ninety percent of SSN members are university and college based, but it also includes PhDs from research institutes who collaborate with university scholars.
• SSN leverages the ongoing work and civic commitment of excellent people already employed in colleges and universities.

Achieving Public Impact

• SSN grows its membership and adds chapters and working groups to help university scholars influence public discussions and policymaking.
• SSN is constantly experimenting to do this more effectively and has achieved successes in working with journalists, policymakers, and civic and advocacy groups.
• SSN combines member with a compact cental staff.
• A lot of what SSN people do is conceived and carried through by volunteer scholars.

Staff Efforts to Help

• There ideas, energy, and network connections have been put as their central resources.
• The hub for member is run by Elizabeth Ghedi-Ehrlich, SSN's Director of Member Relations.
• The efforts to build relationships with policy actors and groups have taken a big leap forward.
• Avi Green has helped SSN members working.
• Linda Naval helped members share briefs and ideas.
• Green has helped SSN members working on the future of the US labor movement share briefs and ideas for reforming unions.
• Naval has arranged for members of SSN's large working group on criminal justice to brief members of Congress.

Regional Achievements

• Beyond such efforts facilitated from SSN's national office, many regional chapters have done very successful relationship-building on thier own.
• The research Triangle network engaged members of Congress in discussions about campaign finance legislation the solons were about to introduce.
• The Bay Area network in California orchestrated a public panel involving many area environmental groups.
• Both the Northwest chapter in Seattle and the Boston area chapter convened discussions among advocates, funders, and scholarly experts interested in better understanding the politics of global warming in the United States.