911 



Accordingly, the CIEP has recommended increases in the funds 

 available to support the program and specifically to make awards 

 more financiall}" adequate, especially for service in the LDCs: 



... It should be possible for a scholar to accept a Fulbright award for lecturing 

 in the less developed countries without financial loss. . . . Dollar supplementation 

 [should be increased]. To be effective, this increase should be substantial — perhaps 

 $1000 for a nine or ten months' award. Fringe benefits to the grantees should 

 also be increased wherever possible by such means as including in the award a 

 foreign-currency allowance for the grantee travel in the host coimtry and sur- 

 rounding region.** 



THE NEED TO MAINTAIN THE QUALITY OF AMERICAN GRANTEES 



Difficulties in securing candidates for LDCs have been accom- 

 panied hy another equally significant and persistent problem — that of 

 maintaining the high quality of American grantees sent to the develop 

 ing countries. The CIEP explained the problem in these terms: 



During the first few years of the Fulbright program, its prestige was high and 

 there was a general feeling that the quality of the grantees was good. The large 

 number of awards offered for research and lecturing in Europe . . . dominated 

 the early program and attracted many distinguished scholars. But as the number 

 of awards oflfered in the less developed countries increased and finally exceeded 

 those in Europe, more persons of modest qualifications were drawn into the 

 program and concern began to be expressed over the quality of the American 

 representation.'" 



CIEP has taken systematic steps toward achieving better standards 

 and improving the quaUty of grantees sent abroad. First, several 

 in-house and extramural studies were performed on the question of 

 quality. The first of these studies, completed in the spring of 1963, 

 compared the quaUty of American grantees sent abroad during the 

 period 1957-58 with the quaUty of those sent abroad during 1962-63. 

 This study revealed that the quality of the program had decreased 

 significantly from 1957 to 1963. In the words of the CIEP: "The 

 program simply grew faster than the manpower resources available to 

 it, which meant that the program had to reach down to lower levels of 

 qualifications in order to meet its requirements." ^"° The second and 

 third studies in this series assessed the merits of procedures used by 

 CIEP evaluation teams in predicting overseas effectiveness of 

 applicants with actual performance in the field. ^"^ Until the mid-sixties 

 CIEP evaluation teams rehed on the following credentials: the 

 professional record of the applicant, the judgments of his colleagues 

 as contained in the four required letters of reference, and evaluations 

 of application materials. The evaluation research on these procedures 

 revealed that the criteria of professional and scholarly competence, 

 the factor given greatest weight by evaluation teams, had low predic- 

 tive value for effective performance abroad. According to CIEP: 



There was another weakness in the traditional procedure [for evaluating ap- 

 plicants]. It equated quality with the candidate's scholarly reputation at home 

 rather than with his probable effectiveness abroad. Were there a close correlation 

 between productive scholarship at home and effectiveness as a Fulbright grantee 

 abroad, this would not matter. But experience has shown that the correlation is 

 not very close ; on the contrar}^, many highlj'- regarded scholars of modest 

 reputation turn in surprisingly fine performances in their overseas assignments. i^^ 



" "Annual Report, CIEP toBFS, 196fr-1967." op. cit., pp. 27,38-9. 



«» "Annual Report, CIEP to BFS, July 1, 1966 to June 30, 1967," op. cit., p. 30. 



"» Ibid., pages 31-32. 



i« The second study, published in June 1964, was prepared by Leonard Goodwin, a research associate of 

 CIEP. Titled "American Professors in Asia," the study focused on predictions of effectiveness and actual 

 effectiveness of American grantees in Asia. The third study was performed in-house. (Ibid., pp. 33-4) . 



i»2 "Annual Report, CIEP to BFS, July 1, 1967 to June 30, 1968", op. cit., p. 2. 



