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THE SPENCER Annual Report for the year ended FOUNDATION March 31, 1998 THE TABLE OF CONTENTS SPENCER 03 Directors, Advisors, and Staff 04 Lyle M. Spencer FOUNDATION 05 The President’s Comments 09 Report of the Vice President Annual The Foundation’s Programs 11 Application and Review Information Report 17 1998 Grants Authorized Research Programs for the year ended March 31, 18 Major Research Grants 19 Small Research Grants 1998 22 The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation/Spencer Foundation Professional Development Research and Documentation Grants 22 Practitioner Research Communication and Mentoring Grants 23 Spencer-Sponsored Conferences Fellowship Programs 24 Spencer Dissertation Fellows 25 National Academy of Education/ Spencer Postdoctoral Fellows 27 Spencer Fellows at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences 28 Spencer Senior Scholars 28 Research Training Grants 29 American Educational Research Association/ Spencer Doctoral Research and Travel Fellows 30 Spencer Mentor Awards 31 Other Grants 32 Grants in Progress 37 Grantee Publications Received 38 Report of the Treasurer 39 Independent Auditors’ Report 40 Financial Statements 900 NORTH MICHIGAN AVENUE SUITE 2800 CHICAGO, IL 60611-6525 TELEPHONE: 312/337-7000 FACSIMILE: 312/337-0282 http://www.spencer.org NOTE: The current members of the Foundation’s Board of Directors, review committees, and staff, as well as updates of the information in this Annual Report, can be found at the Spencer Foundation Web Site, http://www.spencer.org. Additionally, this site permits downloading of the Foundation’s 25th Anniversary Annual Report (1996), the current year’s Annual Report, and select updates to Spencer program information. 1998 ANNUAL REPORT DIRECTORS, ADVISORS, AND STAFF BOARD OF DIRECTORS Courtney B. Cazden PROGRAM ADVISORY COMMITTEE Mary Patterson McPherson Senior Advisor for Research on Practice Steven G. Brint Chair Michael Fultz Cynthia M. Bentel Lee S. Shulman Sarah A. Michaels Program Assistant Vice Chair Brian J. Reiser Leslie Santee Siskin Frank L. Bixby Elizabeth Carrick Program Assistant to J. Douglas Willms Patricia Albjerg Graham the Vice President Kenji Hakuta Josephine Craven Magdalene Lampert Systems Administrator DISSERTATION Robert A. LeVine FELLOWSHIP SELECTION Alejandro Portes Doris E. Fischer Program Assistant COMMITTEE George A. Ranney, Jr. Herbert P. Ginsburg John S. Reed Kathryn A. Gray Jennifer L. Hochschild Program Assistant Annette P. Lareau Carol D. Lee STAFF Julie K. Jessen James L. Leloudis Program Assistant Patricia Albjerg Graham Elinor Ochs President Judith Klippenstein Judith D. Singer Gary Sykes John B. Williams, III Administrative Assistant Vice President and to the President/Assistant Senior Program Officer Secretary to the Foundation Ines M. Milne Alla Kottel PROFESSIONAL Database Manager DEVELOPMENT Secretary and Treasurer RESEARCH AND Valerie Logan DOCUMENTATION Rebecca Barr ADVISORY COMMITTEE Senior Program Officer Administrative/Human Resources Assistant to Sarah Gonzales Catherine A. Lacey the Treasurer Paul Goren Senior Program Officer Paul Hill R. David Matthews Jacqueline Jordan Irvine Lauren Jones Young 1 Staff Assistant Janice E. Jackson Senior Program Officer Carrie A. McGill Susan Moore Johnson Harry Judge Peggy Mueller Program Assistant Susan Lytle Director, Professional Development Research and Mary Ellen Natonski Harold Richman Documentation Program Administrative Assistant Lisa R. Lattuca 2 Martin A. Robinson Associate Program Officer Assistant Controller PRACTITIONER RESEARCH Therese D. Pigott 3 Jennifer P. Savarirayan COMMUNICATION Program Assistant AND MENTORING Associate Program Officer ADVISORY COMMITTEE Mark E. Rigdon George L. Wimberly Martha Rutherford Associate Program Officer Research Assistant Chair Ramona S. Thomas 1 Kimberly A. Wright Dixie Goswami Associate Program Officer Program Assistant Diane Waff 1 beginning August 1998 2 through August 1998 3 through June 1998 3 THE SPENCER FOUNDATION Lyle M. Spencer 1911-1968 ❧ In 1938, while a graduate student in sociology at the University of Chicago, Lyle M. Spencer founded Science Research Associates, which eventually became one of the country’s leading publishers of educational tests, guidance programs, and curriculum materials. Lyle Spencer served as president of SRA from its founding until his death in 1968. ❧ Lyle Spencer established the foundation that bears his name in 1962, with the mandate of investigating ways in which education, broadly conceived, might be improved around the world. The Foundation received its major endowment in 1968 following the founder’s death. Since that time, it has authorized grants totaling approximately $201.7 million. Its assets as of March 31, 1998, were $494 million. 4 1998 ANNUAL REPORT THE PRESIDENT’S COMMENTS Patricia Albjerg Graham s our 1998 fiscal year ended on March 31, ing power. Hence, we are well aware that the Awe at the Spencer Foundation realized current high watermark for our endowment that the assets of the Foundation have essen- cannot be assumed to be permanent. It may tially doubled in the last three years. After a well drop or it may remain stationary or period of relative stability during the previous increase. Our planning for the Foundation’s decade from the mideighties to the mid- programs must encompass all three possibili- nineties, when the assets fluctuated between ties: declining, static, or increased assets. $200 million and $250 million, they surged to Such planning for uncertainty presents a $494 million at the close of this fiscal year and challenge to Board and staff. Federal tax regu- to $510 million at the date of our June 1998 lations regarding foundations such as ours Board meeting. require that 5 percent of the annual average of Nearly all the Spencer assets are invested in assets be distributed each year. Thus, we have equities, approximately 80 percent of which are had to consider ways in which to spend our in U.S. stocks, divided between an active man- increased resources consistent with the knowl- ager (Cedarpoint Capital Management, Inc.) edge that they may or may not continue to and a Standard and Poor 500 indexed fund. The grow. Programmatic commitments, as well as remaining 20 percent are in an international administrative costs, must remain flexible to indexed fund, that excludes Japanese invest- adjust to changing fiscal realities. Those con- ments. This allocation of our assets to equities, straints have led us to clarify the assumptions a decision recommended by our Finance and underlying our programmatic decisions. Seven Audit Committee and voted by our Board, is principles guide our programmatic decisions. unusual for foundations, most of which have The Spencer Foundation: more diversified investment strategies. Our Board believes that, over the long-term, invest- 1. supports research related to education of ment in equities brings the highest returns. We the highest quality we can identify; also recognize, of course, that such an invest- 2. develops a community of researchers ment strategy makes the Foundation’s assets committed to understanding and improv- subject to much more volatility than would be ing education; the case if funds were invested in a broader mix 3. focuses attention and support upon junior of bonds and government securities. Our scholars; Board’s judgment remains that the risk of 4. seeks ways of learning from educational volatility is acceptable for a foundation that practice; has low fixed costs and can adjust its grant making to accommodate such changes in 5. assists the public in recognizing what assets. research about education reveals; Historically, in the 1970s, the Spencer 6. encourages scholars, researchers, and Foundation experienced considerable change other knowledgeable individuals to pro- in its assets when inflation was high, and the pose research projects to us rather than value of the endowment decreased in purchas- issuing requests for proposals; and 5 THE SPENCER FOUNDATION The President’s Comments 7. seeks opportunities to provide support community to propose to us their most com- for worthy educational ventures in our pelling questions about education throughout home city of Chicago. the life span, both in the U.S. and abroad. The application of these principles to pro- The Small Research Grants Program has grammatic decisions demands two kinds of now raised its maximum grant from $12,000 to decisions: 1) devising means by which pro- $35,000. This increase is intended to allow grams could be expanded or shrunk depending junior faculty members, particularly, to buy on changes in our assets, a process we have themselves out of a term of teaching in order to come to term an “accordion-like quality” of our devote full time to their research. Such concen- grant making; and 2) determining which pro- tration upon research, we believe, is generally grams to maintain in existing fashion, which to necessary to produce quality work. Too often expand, which to delete, and which new ones faculty attempt to fit preparation of a scholarly to begin. paper into the interstices of academic life, between teaching classes, counseling students, The consequences of these decisions are and attending meetings on or off campus. Most found in the Report of the Vice President fol- of us cannot generate fundamental new ideas lowing my comments in this document. Here, in such circumstances. Most need time to con- however, I would like to include some observa- centrate upon the ideas we are attempting to tions about how we came to the