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title: Zoom Call with Tom and Ramon 3rd Feb 2022

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# Zoom Call with Tom and Ramon 3rd Feb 2022

## Background

Some members (Tom, John, Matt McKay) of the [QuantEcon](https://quantecon.org) team are applying for funding from [Schmidt Futures](https://www.schmidtfutures.com/) (SF) to assist in providing training and education in computational methods for public economic policy.

SF proposes that we do this by founding an institute that runs courses and is 
* initially supported by SF
* eventually supported by revenue from running courses.

Decision timeline is soon --- Feb, March --- but we can push it back.

## Notes on Schmidt Futures

"We scour the Earth searching for the next visionaries, betting early on the power of their ideas to solve hard problems in science and society."

* Deep pockets, for profit but philanthropic.
* Loves impact
* Doesn't care about branding
* Believes in open source / open science
* Big on diversity
* Believes we need more cross-disciplinary research / education
* Proposals by invitation only

## Notes on QuantEcon

"QuantEcon is a nonprofit organization dedicated to improving economic modeling by enhancing computational tools for economists."

* Likes modern, open source computational tools
* Large amount of existing teaching material
* Code libraries in Python and Julia
* Already runs some training -- e.g., New York Fed, RBA, Central Bank of Chile


## Suggestions for Institute

Institute for Computational Economic Science?

Role models:
* Santa Fe Institute 
* Barcelona School of Economics?

Possible mission statement: "The Institute for Computational Economic Science is a cross-disciplinary, non-profit organization dedicated to the development and communication of modern computational methods for solving economic problems to the benefit of humanity and the well-being of our planet.   Where feasible, the institute advocates open source scientific solutions to facilitate quality, integrity and replicability, consistent with the highest scientific standards, as well as international collaboration and open sharing of computational scientific knowledge.   Through education and research, the institute aims to improve economic policy by strengthening computational capacity in policy-making institutions around the globe."


## Current State of Proposal

Current plan is for a two-track system

### Track 1

QuantEcon team will run training courses in policy institutions.

In the process, team will 
* make connections
* write more targeted material
* meet potential students 
* assess demand in different areas

### Track 2

Managerial team will
* facilitate track 1 training courses
* investigate founding of institute
* recruit staff
* plan budget
* hire/purchase facilities
* start institute
   
   
### Roadblocks

* Need high level people who can and want to start an institute
* Need energetic administrators who can organize and "sell our product"
* Need more diversity

### Questions

* How can we build synergies with other SF initiatives?
* How can we do market research to build proposal?
* Where will the institute be based?