The bipartisan Commission issued Our Common Purpose: Reinventing American Democracy for the 21st Century to both strengthen institutions and bolster civil society. Work is underway to advance initiatives rooted in that report that will help make the nation emerge as a more resilient democracy by 2026, the nation’s 250th anniversary.

As the economic and technological gap widened between the developed nations and the developing world, the Academy, the National Academy of Sciences, and other scientific organizations considered the feasibility of establishing an International Foundation for Science to support the research of young scientists and technical investigators in developing countries. In 1972, the IFS was established as a nongovernmental organization in Stockholm.

After an examination of research literature showed that evaluations of many educational interventions were nearly useless because they provided little reliable information about whether programs worked, the Academy created The Center for Evaluation to apply meta-analysis to the problem. Researchers extracted information from experimental data from multiple sources to analyze studies on topics such as optimum class size and grouping students according to skill levels.

Drawing from national leaders in education, business, and government, this commission analyzed the current state of undergraduate education and offers recommendations to improve the quality of student learning, increase college completion rates, and ensure all students have access to an affordable postsecondary education.

The Commission on the Humanities and Social Sciences claimed a space in the national dialogue for the humanities and the social sciences and recommended specific steps that government, schools and universities, cultural institutions, businesses, and philanthropies could take to support and strengthen these areas of knowledge.