SUPPORT FROM PRIVATE PHILANTHROPY 



facilities which attract the most stimulating teachers. Several 

 other important considerations that argue for the active encour- 

 agement of research in our liberal arts colleges should not be 

 overlooked. It seems quite probable, for example, that there 

 still exists a certain number of excellent scientists who for one 

 reason or another feel ill at ease as members of large research 

 teams and who will do their best work in a calmer, more reflec- 

 tive atmosphere. Furthermore, an important fraction of our 

 future business leaders and men of affairs receive their prepara- 

 tion for life in liberal arts colleges. Even though they take only 

 the required minimum of science courses, it is important that 

 they have an opportunity to see real live scientists at work and 

 to recognize them as reasonably normal members of any com- 

 munity. Increasingly, people in all walks of life have to take 

 personal and public decisions which involve science in one 

 way or another, and it seems more than merely worthwhile to 

 provide them with early opportunities for seeing what science 

 is all about. Finally the presence of working scientists in the 

 smaller towns in which many of our liberal arts colleges are 

 situated should have a salutary effect on the surrounding com- 

 munity. Through Rotary Club talks and occasional articles in 

 the local press, they could provide a personal touch which 

 would help the average citizen to view science as organized 

 common sense and not some sort of magic carried on in palaces 

 and castles in certain capital cities. 



Another important area (one not mentioned by the com- 

 mittee) in which private foundations have some important 

 advantages and opportunities is the forwarding of basic research 

 on an international or worldwide basis. The need for develop- 

 ing basic research as a background for technical advance in 

 many underdeveloped areas of the world is so obvious as to 

 need no special analysis here. Governments and private agen- 

 cies are already embarked on programs designed to this end. 



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