I believe it is an excellent question. What can be the best model and approach toward creation, maintenance, sustainability etc of Scholarly Environment. All researchers and scholars should work on developing the Scholarly Environment Index.

Some of the factors I think necessary to be taken into account of the scholarly environment index are teaching staff, library, Internet connections, lecture rooms, experimental facility, rest spaces, eating and dining areas, distance to the residence area. and convenience of public transportation.

We can also have an e-commons Room where researchers can enter a digital space designated for them at the University and collaborate with other faculty in doing and sharing their research.

Many thanks,

Debra

 Its not so simple matter, Might be we need to define scholarly environment by all possible aspects first.......!!

As many do believe that they have a very supportive environment for scholarly work, but infect its not.

And at the same time some do believe that for their own national and selective students & employees, they have scholarly environment but they are totally unaware from integrated interaction and factual outputs of deliberate ignoring the areas which have no ethical need to ignore........!!

There is a remarkable difference between personal understanding based or  egoestic environment based on any parameters and real scholarly environment..........nature give knowledge to those who can share it for betterment of humanity.........all other time being progress is always with deep ups and downs........which ultimately leads no where.......!!

Regards,

Dear Raja N A Khan

As usual, interesting question that creativity relates to the environment and even more sustainable environmental research.

The items proposed as develop approaches or assumptions seem relevant, but only address some of them and others, I hope will be gradually developed by other researchers.

• As in other networks of discussion and argument, we have met several participants that Creativity is an expression of intelligence and ability to recapitulate and reorient the discourse and direction of certain theories or practices
• Creativity also has to do with the development of original thoughts in addition to the capacity and capability to make tangible, take them to the ground of reality in order to observe the natural and social phenomena; and experiments in the field, as this could be creating original knowledge, technologies and technological innovations.
• At the same time, recent theoretical and practical consideration and speculation between consciousness and artificial consciousness (technology and sociocultural) as a "supra-consciousness" that together paid to amplification and richness of human Creativity interaction.

On the other hand, Creativity also involves reflection and re-structuring of thoughts, ideas and from a certain perspective already accepted by the scientific community knowledge:

• As an example in the field of Environment, conducting ecological research as afforestation strategies and recovery mantles aquifers sustainably in order to enrich certain people and not depredarla of their natural wealth.

Another aspect to consider is the amount of research being done on Ecological and Environmental issues and at the same time providing for the economic aspect, or that these are Sustainable.

• You can make a blibliométrica research questions or keywords of sustainable research in ecological, environmental conservation, recovery and maintenance of water sources for human consumption, enrichment of agricultural soils, recycling native crops (grasses, corn, legumes, vegetables) for conservation of soil nutrients growing powers;
• Also documentary research on topics of culture or transgenic products, environmental impact eco-tourism, coastal urbanization and ecological damage coral clusters.
• Also few graduates of careers in biology, ecology, oceanography, forestry disciplines, etc; training at different levels: technical, with a degree, specialty or degree (master's, doctoral and postdoctoral).
• With data enrollment and number of graduates, one can calculate the Academic Performance Indicator, certification and terminal efficiency, labor market; indicator graduates and occupation of jobs related careers gift Ecology and Environment.
• Finally indicator calculation Graduates of Environmental Sciences and number of researchers in these disciplines. At the same time, researchers Environmental Science and Sustainable Conservation, Ecological Niches, or plants and animals in danger of extinction.

Greetings to all

Dr. Jose Luis Garcia Vigil

Thanks Dear all........its very helping input by you......hope we will move forward and find further deep down insights of scholarly environment as its need of time 

Regards,

Raja 

Dear Dr Khan

I congratulate you on this wonderful question. Really it is hard to collect these variables together to reach a fair assessment, as the meeting together in one researcher may be unavailable that I did not say impossible, but putting different standards and taking the average of the arithmetic may be acceptable. I think that this question fit for extensive study.

Wonderful contribution @ all 

Dear all! It is true, the answers given by Dr. Garcia Vigil and Dr. Tabata are really complete. For training, we need to create optimum conditions. We all understand that this future.

Very interesting question and comments. And very important. 

You might like to see a paper that Robert Root-Bernstein et al. published in the JOURNAL OF GENIUS AND EMINENCE in 2016.  They showed which universities in the US were producing the most highly creative scholars and they offered some suggestions as to the important factors.  Importantly, grants given to a university were NOT related to the quality of scholarship. That does not surprise me at all, given what I have seen as a professor at a Research I university. Creativity is not at all important. Just grants.  Alas.  

Thank you for the invitation. Colleagues have posted interesting responses. The attached files may be helpful too, with regard to the question.

Regards

https://www.aaup.org/issues/diversity-affirmative-action/resources-diversity-and-affirmative-action/building-better-scholarly-environments

https://www.medschool.lsuhsc.edu/Medical_Education/Graduate/MEDS/docs/CREATING%20A%20SCHOLARLY%20ENVIRONMENT%20OF%20INQUIRY.pdf

I just read the most recent answer posted to this interesting question and conversation.  I hate to bring it up, but it is on my mind nearly constantly now that we have a bozo as President elect.  Trump is appointing anti-science people to his cabinet, include to head the EPA.  Most of us in the US are sick over the results of the election and still fighting.  I should probably state that I am not representing the entire University where I work.  But I do speak for every scientist I know in the US.  At this point a good way to support creative research is to move out of the US.  It takes time to fight and the President is supporting anti-science. Sorry if this is not the kind of answer you want to read.  Please look at my earlier answer for a more academic response. 

 President-'Elect Trump is best answers for many polices and answers 

I think, you cannot build a creative personality. Creativity is born. You can only adjust the performance and this is more dependent on the financial and social environment of the person to be creative. Picasso was a bad student “For being a bad student, I was banished to the 'calaboose,' but he was a tremendously creative personality and was considered radical in his work.

I personally think that "Scholarly Environment" is a negative factor to Creativity.  Creativity is born to be beyond the normal.  

Dear Dr. Runco,

Dear All,

''I just read the most recent answer posted to this interesting question and conversation...''

Obviously, Dr. Runco, you are referred to my answer. Could you be so kind to enlighten me, at least, for any possible link between my aforementioned answer and yours?

Regards

Raja Kahn:  Trump states that ozone depletion is a myth and attributes it to the Chinese.  That makes sense because his concern is money and supporting big business.  He wants a guy named Pruitt for to head the Environmental Protection Agency, and Pruitt is quite clear that he does not believe the science supporting ozone depletion. Pruitt and Trump are non-science.  If they have their way, research will suffer, and the environment will be hurt beyond repair. We are so close to that now. These two have already pointed to NASA and the satelittes that monitor the ozone will be turned off.  Trump's non-science views, policies, and cabinet will hurt us all, not just researchers--though research will take a huge hit. No researcher or scientist could support Trump, no could anyone who cares about the environment. 

I believe the research on "supportive environments for creativity and innovation" would be very relevant.  Amabile, Witt, Rickards, and a few others have all published them in the CREATIVITY RESEARCH JOURNAL.  I recently drew from each of those (and 3-4 others) and put together an eclectic version that included factors that support creativity in an organization and factors that inhibit creativity and innovation in an organization. The academic org is of course a bit different from a business org, but there is research specifically on the academic environment (and its unique supports and barriers). At least one paper was published on just that, the academic environment supporting creativity, not long ago in the CRJ.  I can dig up the citation if you wish. I have all of the research mentioned here as well, and I have most of the measures too. 

I think Mark is pointing you in a useful direction. For what it may be worth, I'll add a few thoughts of my own - things that occurred to me when I ran a study of scholarly productivity about ten years ago. 

Begin with the simple facts that (1) people respond to incentives, (2) original work, whether in science or humanities, requires ample free time, (3) resources matter, and (4) collaborators and assistants make it possible to produce much more, as well as supplying new ideas. I think there are simple proxies for each of these. That is, they can be estimated based on public information or with a minimum of questioning.

1. How important is original research to decisions about promotion, tenure, pay increases, etc.? This one would require a bit of investigation, but shouldn't be hard to figure out.

2. What portion of professorial time is taken up by other tasks? The easiest proxy here is teaching load. Obviously, for example, someone teaching a 4/4 load is in a different situation than someone teaching a 2/1 load! This can be ascertained readily by contacting the human resources or academic affairs office.

3. Institutional endowment (or endowment per faculty member, or per student) is a good proxy for available resources. This information is readily available.

4a. One's departmental colleagues are an obvious pool of potential collaborators. The number of full-time professors in a department would therefore be a pretty good proxy for this one. (If you wanted to go further, you could try to estimate how many other schools are within a given radius, such as 25 miles. For example, it's easier to find a partner in Boston than in Orono.)

4b. The most obvious group of built-in assistants would be graduate students. So the number of doctoral students would be a good proxy here. Students pursuing terminal master's degree might also be counted, but I would discount them since they aren't around as long and don't need to do as much original research. Maybe count each doctoral student as equal to 3 master's students? Anyway, the number of degrees awarded is readily available.

There are certainly many other factors that matter, and the articles Mark is offering will help you to identify them. But these are, I think, a good starting point.

You make so many good points Stephen. Your 2nd paragraph hits on much of what is in fact in those measures of "settings and climates for creativity and innovation."  Well said.  I must say something about your 2nd and 3rd points:  As for endowments, I know in a recent case where it was a problem, but only because the administrators saw the money and wanted to use it for this own purposes. They ignored the actual endowment, which was for research, and said "go get grants."  This makes no sense because (a) the endowment should support research until you get a grant, not only if you get a grant, and (b) as I said the endowment said nothing about grants. In short, the administrators abused this particular endowment.   More important is your 3rd point about time. I think most everyone overlooks this. Yes it is in the measures of settings and climate, but many people (again, administrators in particular) do not realize that research requires time to think, not just time to collect and analyze data.  I might even say that, even if you have quite a bit of time for research, if you have other responsibilities, they distract you. They keep you from the deep thought where creative thinking occurs.  I suppose I am just saying that there are both things people need for creative research (time and resources) and things that get in the way and must be avoided (such as distraction).  Forgive me if all of this is obvious. Again, my compliments on your contribution above.    

Dear Mark Runco

Thanks for you very helping contributions on the topic. Its really very nice. what can be / How can we estalish Check point base flow chart to establish & estimate SE-Index for academics ?

As for as policy matters about President Elect Trump is concerned toward the science industry, I think wait is the best option to see the actual outcome as to run a country sometimes its necessary to deal first with the pre-developed complexities to fix them on priority basis to sustain progressive activities in a longer run. Change shift are always characterized by Detachment & Re-attachments. Perhaps its too soon to estimate the expected results. 

Regards,

 Dear Stephen Joy

Thanks for such a Nice contribution. its really very helping. How can we make a check point base flow chart to establish & estimate SE-index for academia ?

Regards,

Raja Khan: Thank you for the nice response.  And forgive me for diving into politics. I do think it relevant (at least the non-science cabinet Trump has appointed) and think that "wait and see" will hurt us. We do not have much longer to protect the ozone, for example. Irreparable damage has been done, and 4 more years of it failing to protect it will put many more species into extinction. I propound proactive sustainability, and I see that the new cabinet will make that impossible. Their decisions are based on big business and not the environment. 

That being said, I will do my best to focus on the academic side of things.  This really is a good discussion. I will look back and give more though to the S-E index you mentioned. Best wishes, Mark 

Dear Raja Khan -

My suggestion is to use easily acquired data that approximate what you're really after. That's why I used the term "proxy" in some cases. I'd say the thing to do is to create a list of criteria, with each one rated on something like a 5-point scale (could be anywhere from 3 - 10 points; I'm just tossing out a plausible number). The criteria I've suggested are:

1. Importance of research/creative work to promotion/tenure decisions.

2. Teaching load (higher teaching load = less support for creative works).

3. Institutional endowment per full-time faculty member.

4a. Number of full-time faculty members (in same department or school-wide; your pick).

4b. Number of graduate students, perhaps weighted as 3 times the number of doctoral degrees awarded per year + 1 times the number of terminal master's degrees awarded.

You can make weighting decisions as you go, based on the raw findings. For example, you may find that there are only about 4 levels of teaching load (1/2, 2/2, 3/3, and 4/4), so you could score those as 4, 3, 2, and 1 respectively. (I suppose someone at a school that doesn't require teaching at all, like Rockefeller U., would get a 5!). You might find that department size ranges from just 2-3 up to 50 or more, and just draw lines to separate this into five ranges. And so forth. Really, you're in charge of the initial weighting.

Of course these are just proxies, correlates of what we're really after. As Mark says, you could have a school that doesn't want to let endowment money be spent on research. You could have a large department in which nobody else does anything like what you do, so they aren't useful collaborators. And so on. But it's a start. These indicators should be related to what you're after.

And of course there will be others I didn't think of.

Please understand Mark's bringing our recent election into this. Most of the nation's intelligentsia are dismayed by the result. We could live with a few years of things not going our way (that's happened before, as during the G.W. Bush presidency), but this one seems like it could imperil the future of life on earth - as in mass extinction events we're already on the verge of. It's hard not to bring it into every conversation.

Dear All Hope you will find this article interesting with further additions.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/314095663_CREATIVITY_FACTORS_Ck_CREATIVITY_RESISTANCE_FACTORS_Rs_BRAIN_QUANTUM_MATRIX_Mq_NATURAL_Versus_ACQUIRED

Regards,

Article CREATIVITY FACTORS (Ck), CREATIVITY RESISTANCE FACTORS (Rs) ...