Description
Many scholars conduct research with important policy implications but do not have the time or the skills to apply their research to policy challenges or to integrate policy perspectives into their teaching. Some faculty—especially at comprehensive research universities or well-resourced liberal arts colleges—have more frequent sabbaticals and access to research and travel funds; they’re able to gain the skills to translate research into policy on their own. But faculty at regional state universities, historically black college and universities, and other minority-serving institutions have a harder time.
For the last five years, the Faculty Leaders Program at the Pardee RAND Graduate School (PRGS) has brought 12-14 faculty from just such institutions to PRGS each summer for an intensive, week-long, policy analysis workshop. The faculty propose specific projects related to their own research that they hope to pursue. In addition to taking formal courses with PRGS faculty focused on policy analysis, research communication, and integrating policy into the classroom, the participants are also mentored by PRGS faculty with relevant expertise.
Since the program’s inception, PRGS has welcomed faculty from 37 institutions, including several Cal State campuses, Oakland University, Towson University, Utah State University, and 10 public and private HBCUs—among them, Florida A&M, Tougaloo College, Tuskegee University, Jackson State University, and Dillard University. The faculty participants come from fields as disparate as sociology, public health, international affairs, political science, and urban studies. In recent years, they have pursued projects related to the US energy boom, retention of students in STEM fields, restorative justice in municipal courts, and discipline in schools.
PRGS intends to continue the program. Support from the Luce Foundation will help them to do so; but a grant will also enable them to reach out more aggressively to scholars in the humanities and qualitative social sciences. PRGS has been able to attract faculty in health fields and in other policy-adjacent fields with less difficulty; it has been harder to recruit faculty in such fields as area studies, religion, anthropology, and history—many of whom have much to contribute to contemporary policy discussions and perhaps even less access to the training needed to apply their research to policy.
PRGS leadership hopes that the program will enrich policy discussions by bringing under-represented communities and disciplines to the table. At the same time, those involved in the program hope that policy-engaged faculty at less well-resourced and minority-serving institutions will encourage their students to pursue policy studies at the graduate level—including at PRGS.
The Higher Education program and the Foundation generally have long sought to ensure that public policy and public discussion are informed by high-quality research.
The Luce Foundation’s grant would enable PRGS to administer the program for two more years and to reach out especially to scholars in fields that have been less well-represented in the program. Grant monies would be used to support stipends for the participants, instructional costs, and a portion of project management costs, among others.
Debra Knopman is principal researcher at RAND and a professor at Pardee RAND Graduate School.
Recommendation: That the Directors of the Henry Luce Foundation approve a two-year grant of $150,000 to the RAND Corporation to support the continuation and expansion of the Faculty Leaders Program at the Pardee RAND Graduate School.
Approved by Board: November 2, 2017
