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8 Takeaways From Harvard’s Task Force Reports
"An artificial and fundamentally wrong division" is developing between research and teaching in the nation's universities, according to a report by President Eisenhower's Science Advisory Committee on the role of federal aid in science and technology.
Dean Bundy, who was instrumental in drafting the report, said yesterday that it generally represents his opinions on the expanding role of governmental support to institutions for scientific teaching and research. The committee proposed that federal grants go on a less restricted basis than at present to increase faculty salaries, to offset the universities cost of training graduate students, and to pay for new facilities.
The study reportedly stemmed from concern by committee members that the government, through its grants, might be distorting the basic functions of the institutions. The report also criticized the universities themselves for the division between teaching and research.
Research Depends on Aid
"Whether the quantity and quality of basic research...will be adequate or inadequate," the report added, "depends primarily upon the Government of the United States."
Harvard is not plagued by this "wrong division" very much as the University, unlike most others, does not accept grants for secret projects, according to Don K. Price, Dean of the School of Public Administration. Price is collaborating on a report to President Pusey on the role of federal aid to the University.
Price and Daniel K. Cheever, Special Assistant to Pusey to prepare a report on federal aid, agreed, after a cursory reading of the report, that it was "useful and well-done."
Large Source of Income
The University receives a total of $18.1 million from federal grants, which represents more than a fourth of its full income. Largest recipients of the government support, most of which goes to areas of science, are Faculty of Arts and Sciences ($8.4 million), Medical School ($5.9 million), and School of Public Health ($1.6 million).
The $18.1 million is second only to tuition and student fees which total $22.1 million as a source of University income, according to budgetary figures for fiscal 1960.
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