As never before, human welfare today depends upon the results of research, and upon the steady stream of scholars needed for the increasingly arduous demands of intellectual leadership. That unit of the educational system most directly responsible for stimulating research and for developing scholarly leadership is the graduate school. How to maintain high-grade graduate instruction and research is now one of the most pressing of all the problems connected with the national economy and culture. It has become increasingly acute in recent years because of the extraordinary demands made upon graduate schools in preparing college professors and research workers in the rapidly multiplying departments of science and art and in supplementing the work of the colleges in educating the vast number of teachers and administrators for the growing system of public and private schools. At the same time, nearly all types of professional schools, including teachers colleges, within and without the universities, have been engaged to full capacity in trying to meet the demands for advanced professional education. The staffing of these professional schools has been a task of the graduate school. The raising by State departments of education of standards of certification of high-school teachers and the increasing of requirements for licensure in many professions have been important contributing factors in this situation. In order to help overcome difficulties arising from this expansion of graduate and research activities, a number of associations of institutions of higher education and of professional schools, during recent years, have made studies and surveys of many phases of education on the graduate level. And inasmuch as the brunt of graduate study and research in all fields finally falls on the graduate school of arts and sciences it was naturally felt that a special study of this unit was highly desirable. The results of this study will not only be helpful in laying the basis for further study of graduate work, but it will be stimulating to members of graduate school faculties, university administrators, and others immediately connected with graduate study and research. It should prove of the greatest value to the large and increasing number of young scholars whose talents are leading them in the direction of membership in university faculties and in research organizations. The orientation thus provided may help the future leaders of scholarship and investigation to see the problems of advanced study and research as a whole, in their larger purposes and relations, rather than in those which are narrow or one-sided. Agencies and individuals concerned with the cultural and scientific leadership of the United States should also gain new viewpoints of the best ways in which this country may strengthen its contributions to the world. An appendix presents the Reports of Committee Meetings. (Contains 6 footnotes.) [Best copy available has been provided.].

From curriculum standards and testing to school choice and civic learning, issues in American education are some of the most debated in the United States. The Institutions of American Democracy , a collection of essays by the nation's leading education scholars and professionals, is designed to inform the debate and stimulate change.In association with the Annenberg Foundation Trust at Sunnylands and the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania, The Institutions of American Democracy is the first in a series of books commissioned to enhance public understanding of the nature and function of democratic institutions. A national advisory board--including, among others, Nancy Kassebaum Baker, David Boren, John Brademas, Ellen Condliffe Lagemann, David Gergen, and Lee Hamilton--will guide the vision of the project, which includes future volumes on the press and the three branches of government.Each essay in The Institutions of American Democracy addresses essential questions for policymakers, educators, and anyone committed to public education. What role should public education play in a democracy? How has that role changed through American history? Have the schools lost sight of their responsibility to teach civics and citizenship? How are current debates about education shaping the future of this democratic institution?Among the contributors are William Galston, Director of the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy at the University of Maryland;Clarence Stone, Professor in the Department of Government and Politics at the University of Maryland - College Park and editor of Changing Urban Education and Regime Politics: Governing Atlanta, 1946-1988 (University Press of Kansas, 1998).; Susan Moore Johnson, Pforzheimer Professor of Education in Learning and Teaching, Harvard University; Michael Johanek, Executive Director of K-12 Professional Development, College Board; Kathy Simon, co-executive director of the Coalition for Essential Schools and author of Moral Questions in the Classroom (Yale University Press, 2001); and Jennifer Hochschild, Professor of Government and Professor of Afro-American Studies at Harvard University and author of Facing Up to the American Dream: Race, Class, and the Soul of the Nation (Princeton University Press, 1995).

There is almost no political question in the United States, wrote Alexis de Tocqueville, that is not resolved sooner or later into a judicial question. The U.S. Supreme Court is the ultimate arbiter of judicial questions, weighing the laws enacted by the people's representatives against the inviolable fundamental law embodied in the U.S. Constitution. Virtually every vital political and social issue comes before the Court: abortion, affirmative action, capital punishment, elections and voting, gay rights, gun control, separation of church and state, and more. This book presents living law, the case-by-case shaping of the law on each of these controversial issues, in the justices' own words and with informative commentary. There is almost no political question in the United States, wrote Alexis de Tocqueville, that is not resolved sooner or later into a judicial question. The U.S. Supreme Court is the ultimate arbiter of judicial questions, weighing the laws enacted by the people's representatives against the inviolable fundamental law embodied in the U.S. Constitution. Virtually every vital political and social issue comes before the Court: abortion, affirmative action, capital punishment, elections and voting, gay rights, gun control, separation of church and state, and more. This book presents living law, the case-by-case shaping of the law on each of these controversial issues, in the justices' own words. ; Guide to the Court's functions and the ways in which it goes about its work ; Topically organized sequences of cases through which the law on particular issues evolved, including the facts of each case; the specific issues before the Court; the Court's decision, embodied in the text of the majority opinion; an account of all opinions handed down; and excerpts from the most influential concurrences and dissents ; Commentary summarizing current federal law on each of the controversial topics covered, with notes on the historical background—and in some cases the turbulent aftermath—of the Court's decisions

On Monday, May 4th, 1970, members of the Ohio National Guard fired 61 rounds of bullets into the Kent State University students protesting about the invasion of Cambodia. This work develops the ideas of the first symposium on American democracy established to commemorate the tragedy.