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.

To address a deepening crisis in the lives of America’s children, the Academy organized a steering committee to explore how the Academy could increase the nation’s commitment to and investment in children.

The Academy hosted an international planning meeting to develop a proposal for a new world-class research center in Brazil that would help develop the country’s research capabilities in the life sciences.

In 1977, nearly twenty-five years after the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision found that “separate educational facilities are inherently unequal,” the aftershocks were still affecting American society. The Academy convened an interdisciplinary study group to examine the post-Brown urban school integration experience and to consider solutions to ongoing education inequality in American classrooms.

The increased role of women in science in this country was the result of the convergence of two trends: the growth in higher education and expanded employment for middle-class women on the one hand, and the growth, bureaucratization and professionalization of science and technology, on the other.

This project examined the factors underlying recent scandals at a number of American corporations. The project’s publication, Restoring Trust in American Business, includes a set of recommendations for rebuilding the trust upon which the American system of capitalism depends.

The Commission on Language Learning examined the current state of language education, projected what the nation’s education needs would be in the future, and offered recommendations for ways to meet those needs.

This commission is dedicated to ensuring all students, especially historically underserved students, can thrive and find rewarding jobs in an ever-changing global economy, empowering them to actively engage in society. 

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.

Meeting the Challenges of the New Nuclear Age examines some of the possible escalation pathways that could lead one or more nuclear weapons states to use nuclear weapons and aims to articulate a set of recommendations for de-escalating possible nuclear crises mostly involving the United States and its allies.

Located around the globe but operated by American parent institutions, interdisciplinary American Overseas Advanced Research Centers provide essential support to American humanistic and social science scholars working in foreign countries.

Challenges for International Scientific Partnerships aimed to articulate the benefits of international collaboration and recommend solutions to the most pressing challenges associated with the design and operation of partnerships. This initiative sought to identify policy recommendations and best practices to mitigate challenges for international science collaborations, including physical facilities, distributed networks, and peer-to-peer partnerships.

The focus of this study was to better understand the role of Confucianism - long thought to be incompatible with the spirit of capitalism - in industrialization.

The Commission seeks to reimagine the nation’s political economy, rethink the values that drive economic policy making, and advance recommendations that help individuals, communities, and the nation flourish.

In 1973, the Academy formed a planning committee to explore the development and creation in the United States of an institute for advanced humanistic studies, somewhat analogous to the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences in Palo Alto and the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton.

Less than one-third of American undergraduates major in the natural sciences, mathematics, or engineering. This project examined the goals of science requirements for nonscientists, and how students fulfill those requirements, in an effort to inform curriculum policies at higher education institutions.

In October 1999, a distinguished group of scholars from different disciplines was convened to assess the evolution of law over the previous hundred years. Each contributor was asked to write about a particular area of law, or a theme in law and legal scholarship, tracing developments and interrelated changes in the legal and the social order.

Using the field of chemistry as a case study, this project probed how the expansion of electronic communications is altering the collection, dissemination, and storage of scholarly information.

This multi-disciplinary Academy initiative is focused on the urgent global challenge of climate change and recommending meaningful actions to accelerate climate mitigation and adaptation strategies for all Americans.

As the second phase of Meeting the Challenges of the New Nuclear Age, this initiative explored challenges created by “new” nuclear weapons states, potential proliferators, and de facto nuclear weapons states.