Former Secretary of State George P. Shultz, former Secretary of Defense William J. Perry, former Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Sam Nunn, and prominent physicist and arms control expert Sidney D. Drell, will be honored with one of the nation’s oldest awards.

Lassina Zerbo, Rose E. Gottemoeller, Siegfried Hecker, and Robert Rosner participated in a discussion on the prospects for ratifying the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty and the challenges presented by nuclear testing.

The Spring 2022 issue of Dædalus on “AI & Society,” guest edited by Academy member James Manyika, explores the many facets of AI: its technology, its potential futures, its effects on labor and the economy, its relationship with inequalities, its role in law and governance, its challenges to national security, and what it says about us as humans. What follows are a few additional remarks and insight from the volume’s guest editor on the collection.

Projects in the Education program area examine the vital role that education plays in our nation and the world. Work in this area seeks to inform policy and practice in support of high-quality educational opportunities for all Americans. From advancing equitable educational outcomes to leveraging new developments in the learning sciences and digital technologies to understanding the vital role that public universities play as engines of economic growth, innovation, social mobility, and citizenship, projects in this area draw on scholars and practitioners from diverse fields to provide guidance and actionable solutions to policymakers, higher education leaders, and philanthropists.

The Academy’s New Haven Program Committee, in partnership with Yale University’s MacMillan Center, hosted a conversation on national and international policies for slowing global warming that featured William Nordhaus (Yale University), recipient of the 2018 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences. The program included remarks from Pinelopi Goldberg (Yale University; formerly, The World Bank Group) and Scott Barrett (Columbia University) as well as introductions from Steven Wilkinson (Yale University) and David Oxtoby (American Academy of Arts & Sciences).

Projects in the Education program area inform policy and practice that support high-quality, educational opportunities for all Americans. Building on the Academy’s long-standing commitment to the vital role that education and knowledge development play in our nation and world, the program area–through commissions, projects, convenings, and publications–engages scholars and practitioners from a range of fields and disciplines to examine the conditions that foster the creation, transfer, and preservation of knowledge throughout our society. These initiatives seek to advance equitable educational outcomes, embrace innovations in educational experiences and learning, and connect developments in technology and the future of work to the classroom and training pathways.

In today’s high-tech and hyperconnected world, threats from insiders go far beyond leakers and lone-wolf shooters. How can we better protect against the enemy within, no matter what it is that needs to be protected?

Select Prizes and Awards to Members

The Academy’s founders understood well the dangers of concentrated power and authoritarian rule. They recognized that a representative government needs checks and balances, the separation of powers, individual rights, and an independent judiciary–“a government of laws, not of men,” in the words of John Adams, one of the Academy’s founders. They also grasped the essential role of free inquiry in sustaining democracy, as well as the importance of liberty as a precondition for the pursuit of knowledge. That vision is captured in the Academy’s seal and motto, Sub Libertate Florent: the arts and sciences “flourish under freedom.”

The Academy holds virtual events as well as in-person events around the country and the world that bring members, representatives of the Affiliates, and others together to explore topics of national and global concern.

Select Prizes and Awards to Members

The Academy holds events virtually as well as in person around the country and the world that bring members, representatives of the Affiliates, and others together to explore topics of national and global concern. Academy President David W. Oxtoby provided opening remarks for most of the meetings listed below.

Members Elected in 2023

William Labov is regarded as the founder of variationist sociolinguistics, a discipline dedicated to understanding and researching language in relation to social factors that include region, class, and gender. Dr. Labov has worked to promote literacy for speakers of nonstandard dialects and to develop reading and teaching materials for these populations.

A dinner discussion on DNA and Art: In Search of the Genome of Leonardo da Vinci, featuring Jesse H. Ausubel, director of the Program for the Human Environment at The Rockefeller University and introductory remarks from Kenneth Wallach (Central National Gottesman Inc.) who cochairs the New York Program Committee.

As part of the 2013 Induction weekend, Ken Burns (President of Florentine Films) and Ernest J. Moniz (U.S. Secretary of Energy) spoke about the challenges and opportunities for the arts and the sciences.

Anna Deavere Smith is many things: an actress, playwright, author, and founding director of the Institute on the Arts and Civic Dialogue at New York University, where she is also University Professor at Tisch School of the Arts. In 2019, she became a member of the Academy and was a featured speaker at the Annual David M. Rubenstein Lecture held during the Induction weekend. After performing two original pieces that combine art, commentary, and journalism, she joined David M. Rubenstein in conversation. Their discussion explored a wide range of topics, from auditions and growing up in Baltimore to memorization and the school-to-prison pipeline.