Contents Page Steering Committee Executive Summary Preface Fulbright at Fifty The Challenge of Change Appendices

The ideal to build international peace through mutual understanding relates as much to the future as it reflects the past. In this effort the Fulbright vision of bringing "a little more knowledge, a little more reason, and a little more compassion into world affairs" provides foundation blocks to construct a peaceful and stable world.

Mission: Values and Leadership

Fulbright should encourage a free and open exchange of views about complex social, cultural, political, and economic issues of the modern world. Illustratively, and with choice and flexibility exercised by binational commissions, these issues might include such basic concerns as the promotion of economic growth; the challenges of democratic governance; the changing role of women; or the impact of technology and environmental change on societies and international affairs.

Fulbright should seek potential leaders in higher education, including state systems, community colleges, and colleges and universities traditionally serving minorities as well as the nation's flagship public and private institutions. Fulbright should also welcome participants from research institutes and other centers of analysis and scholarly inquiry, in business, in the professions, and in journalism, the media, and the arts. The common denominator of these grantees should be the excellence of their proposals, their commitment to serious study, teaching, and scholarship as part of the exchange experience, and their capacity for future achievement.

Recommendations

The steering committee makes eight recommendations:

I. Reaffirm federal support for Fulbright.

II. Maintain the current program with greater emphasis on student grants.

III. Allocate any additional resources to developing nations while maintaining mature programs with traditional partners.

IV. Press for greater financial reciprocity from other governments.

V. Seek new forms of partnership with domestic institutions.

VI. Streamline program management.

VII. Strengthen links with the policy community, academic institutions, Fulbright alumni, and the public.

VIII. Maintain the program's independence and flexibility as it returns to the Department of State and improve the coordination of U.S. government international exchange activities.

I. Reaffirm Federal Support for Fulbright

WE RECOMMEND that to respond to the challenges of the post-Cold War world, the U.S. funding base for Fulbright be rebuilt to at least $125 million annually.

The U.S. government and Congress should reaffirm their commitment to Fulbright. The program remains essential for effective long-term American global engagement. The program will advance the international competence of individuals in many walks of life, identifying and fostering future generations of leadership who are able to understand, communicate, and cooperate with others internationally. Fulbright grantees will continue to build the knowledge and wisdom needed for this society and others to adjust to the rapid changes and tensions of the modern era.

We understand and appreciate the difficulty of finding additional resources in the current U.S. budgetary climate, but urge the Administration and Congress to seek ways to restore Fulbright funding for the next several years to at least $125 million annually (the approximate level, not factoring in inflation, that the program would be without the 1996 reduction). In addition, funding for the Fulbright-Hays program should be restored to its 1995 level of $5.9 million.

II. Maintain the Current Program Emphasis

WE RECOMMEND that Fulbright managers and partners, here and abroad, maintain the current greater emphasis on student grants, continue the scholars grant program, explore opportunities for broader collaboration, and seek wider participation.

The Fulbright program currently funds more students than scholars, both overseas and in the United States. We recommend maintaining this balance, slightly increasing the number of student grants. Recruitment for the Student Grants program should emphasize candidates with leadership potential as well as academic excellence. Grants should include students of all kinds as they embark on careers-education, the sciences and social sciences, arts and humanities, journalism, law, architecture and design, public administration, and other professions. Grant awards should focus on the significance and quality of the proposed study or research. A final product would be a research paper or other creative endeavor.

Scholarly cooperation and student exchange are important vehicles for enhancing cooperation and understanding...

The Scholars Grants program should continue the current emphasis on individual merit-based awards for scholarship and lecturing. In awarding grants, a modest preference should be given to proposals tied to flexible combinations of research and collaboration activities: comparative or cooperative research, curriculum development, as well as various other types of collaboration.

Greater flexibility in the approach, duration, and number of individuals participating should be built into grants. Efforts would be made across the board to encourage funding and offsets that would make possible broader or longer participation.

Faculty from any accredited institution of higher education should be encouraged to participate. Scholars from nonprofit research institutes should also be eligible for participation.

The USIA College and University Affiliations program and the Teacher Exchange program would also continue as small but valuable elements of Fulbright exchanges. The College and University Affiliations would continue to advance links and long-term cooperation, particularly with institutions in developing countries.

The Teacher Exchange Program, a very highly-leveraged effort, pays huge benefits for the teachers involved, and through them, their students, schools, and communities. The program strengthens secondary education; expands the pool of potential college students interested in international matters, and builds the international competence of many Americans and their communities. The Teacher Exchange Program should also continue to seek expanded links and cooperation between schools, community colleges, and their communities.

In fostering wider participation in the program, Fulbright administrators, in consultation with others, might expand on practical workshops on grant application, coordination, and follow-up. Individuals and associations might work closely with community, philanthropic, and business interests, and state and local governments to build financial support for participation, extend the scope of grants, and facilitate possible follow-up or long-term linkages.

Finally, Fulbright and its many partners should build a constructive dialogue on a number of professional concerns raised in the course of our outreach, such as: the relation between foreign area studies and the new emphasis on cross-regional global issues; innovative ways to advance the study of the United States abroad; and the desirability of involving students in certain scholar grants or better relating the student and scholar grants.

III. Allocate New Resources to Developing Nations While Maintaining Mature Binational Programs

WE RECOMMEND several steps to direct resources toward leading developing nations, while maintaining current programs with OECD partners and encouraging regional and multilateral cooperation.

Fulbright should maintain the mature programs in OECD nations (many of which exceed the United States in their support of Fulbright) while augmenting programs with leading developing nations.

The steering committee recommends that Fulbright:

• Allocate funds saved from administrative efficiencies or restored to Fulbright to exchanges with leading developing countries in Asia, Africa, Latin America, and the Middle East.

• Encourage, through challenge grants, pilot multinational projects involving the U.S. and OECD Binational Commissions with developing countries.

• Continue to carry out regional competitions in Africa and in other regions, concentrating resources for the most compelling needs and making possible at least a small number of grants for outstanding proposals regardless of the country of origin.

In today's rapidly changing international context, building more effective engagement with important developing nations, while continuing longstanding cooperation with OECD partner nations, is vital for the future of the Fulbright program. Growing economies and populations, political, cultural and social importance foretell broader international roles for developing countries.

While Fulbright ought to approach exchange needs and opportunities bilaterally important regional and multinational issues and perspectives require attention. Scholarly cooperation and student exchange are important vehicles for enhancing cooperation and understanding needed for these and other multinational entities.

IV. Seek Greater Reciprocity from Other Governments

WE RECOMMEND that the U.S. strenuously seek to establish funding parity from the more financially capable governments.

To advance reciprocity, the steering committee recommends that USIA, with the cooperation of the Fulbright Scholarship Board and U.S. missions abroad:

• Continue to pursue parity of funding with other countries in which binational commissions exist-in support of exchange grants, travel costs, and administrative expenses.

• Seek increased cost-sharing and in-kind contributions from nations in which binational commissions do not exist.

• Establish binational commissions with other nations only as exchange relations mature and both sides contribute significantly to the program and administrative costs.

The concept of reciprocity between nations has always been important for Fulbright. These elements should be strengthened. Augmented contributions from those nations which are increasingly able to form equal partnerships will make these binational programs equivalent to the mature cooperation enjoyed by the U.S. and traditional OECD countries.

V. Create New Partnerships

WE RECOMMEND that, to expand and enrich Fulbright, the U.S. government, the Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board, and the Fulbright Association mount a concerted effort to build stronger partnerships in the non-government sector.

Many nonprofit and for-profit entities in the United States and abroad contribute to Fulbright-academic and professional associations, institutions of higher education, the business community, Fulbright alumni groups, the foundation community, and state and regional organizations of various kinds. Although extensive, these partnerships should be developed more systematically, and new opportunities sought through an expanded outreach effort. (See Appendix D for an illustrative description of partnering activities.)

The steering committee recommends that USIA/State and the Fulbright Scholarship Board:

• Help strengthen alumni involvement here and abroad through the National Fulbright Association and local and state affiliates and international alumni groups. Despite serious recent efforts to locate alumni, records of former Fulbrighters have been fragmentary at best. USIA and its successor entity in the State Department, together with the Fulbright Scholarship Board and the Fulbright Association, should explore ways to build a more comprehensive contact data base and call upon Fulbright alumni for counsel and support. The 250,000 alumni of Fulbright are vital for the future of the program.

• Explore new programmatic connections with the foundation community, seeking opportunities for supporting projects involving Fulbright grantees. Fulbright programs historically have enjoyed fruitful cooperation with U.S. and international foundations, and in the future ought to explore opportunities more thoroughly and continuously.

• Seek new partnerships with increasingly internationally oriented American metropolitan regions. New combinations of state and local governments, business, education, research, and cultural and civic groups are rapidly expanding their international contacts. Fulbright should explore joint sponsorship of grants and special activities.

• Continue to develop cooperative projects with private business, based on mutual interest and guidelines for appropriate involvement.

In consultation with the non-governmental cooperating organizations, higher education, and scholarly groups, Fulbright should:

• Encourage broader incentives for faculty participation in Fulbright, including sabbatical time or "top-off" grants for Fulbright scholars, stopping or adjusting the "tenure clock," and tenure credit for participation.

• Seek extended institutional support for collaborative activities by Fulbright faculty grantees, including reducing or waiving overhead costs, providing staff support where needed, as well as research facilities and facilitation.

• Strengthen study abroad advisory and testing activities. USIA posts and binational commissions are developing very valuable cooperative projects with private organizations to help foreign students gain information and access to U.S. colleges and universities.

The Fulbright Association, with support from the Fulbright Scholarship Board and USIA/State, should:

• Encourage "payback" by Fulbright grantees upon the completion of their project. Repeatedly, participants in our eight outreach symposia expressed interest in continuing engagement on behalf of the program, or voiced support for some form of service by former Fulbrighters. We recognize that the central contributions of Fulbright alumni are their professional commitments and achievements. But the community itself identifies a range of possibilities from mentoring new grantees, participating in orientation, briefings and post-grant activities, assisting in recruitment, sponsoring international internships in various professions, or working with youth exchange groups, local school systems, or community exchange programs.

VI. Streamline Program Management

WE RECOMMEND that Fulbright modernize program management to help focus the program, improve operating efficiency, reduce costs, and serve Fulbrighters better.

WE ALSO RECOMMEND that the administration of the program be based on regular competition.

To reduce complexity and the drain on energy and resources, the steering committee recommends that Fulbright policy makers and administrators:

• Clarify responsibilities among the various entities responsible for administering Fulbright, including setting priorities, allocating resources, reviewing budgets, managing funds, reporting, and recruitment, selection, and placement of grantees.

• Seek additional ways to reduce administrative costs beyond the reductions already put in place in the last several years.

• Simplify scholar placement with developed countries by requiring scholars to arrange their own exchange relationships with host institutions where possible before turning to Fulbright for support.

• Encourage American scholars, where possible, to seek self-placement in developing country institutions, but continue placement services for faculty from developing nations until experience and contacts with U.S. scholars and institutions grow sufficiently.

• Build a consistent data base on the results of Fulbright grants and the career development of grantees. Create a long-term study that augments the required report by all Fulbright grantees and follows post-Fulbright activities. USIA, IIE, CIES and others have carried out highly useful program evaluations; the systematic collection and use of data on exchanges through such publications as Open Doors is increasingly sophisticated. Systematic efforts to follow post-Fulbright careers will add a richer understanding of how alumni build on their grant experience.

The steering committee also believes that program management can be much improved by making much more intensive use of modern telecommunications. Steps under way by IIE/CIES and USIA point the way to major reductions in paper-flow, with faster, less expensive electronic procedures. We also recommend that Fulbright managers:

• With private sector assistance, seek grantee access to the Internet for Fulbright grantees during their grant and, for those in need, one year after the conclusion of their grant.

• Expand use in Fulbright programs in the U.S. and abroad of computer software templates for application and review processes, as well as other steps, including budget and related program planning, tracking, and reporting.

• Explore options for providing information on the World Wide Web on study and research opportunities here and abroad. USIA/State and their partner institutions should assess the several available Internet services and work on a cooperative basis with others to facilitate access or create a new service.

The steering committee also recommends that USIA/State conduct competitions every six to eight years to select the cooperating non-governmental agencies that help administer the Fulbright program. The many contributions of present partnering organizations merit recognition as do the special needs for continuity and experience in carrying out the exchange program. Frequent change of grant administrators is potentially disruptive and wasteful. Nevertheless, we believe competitive bidding for grants and contracts is one of the foundations of open and accountable programs-governmental or private-and should be tried. Over time, an analysis should be performed of the advantages and disadvantages for the Fulbright program of such competition.

VII. Strengthen Links with the Policy Community, Academic Institutions, and the Public

WE RECOMMEND that Congress and the Administration broaden the role of the J. William Fulbright Scholarship Board to encourage it to serve more actively as an advisor to the foreign affairs community on international education issues and as an intermediary with educational groups and the public.

Beyond its Congressionally mandated role in setting broad policy and making the final selection of grantees, the J. William Fulbright Scholarship Board has a significant opportunity to bring the foreign policy and educational communities and the American public together into a more effective partnership. It is all the more important as the program returns to the Department of State, that the Department call upon the Scholarship Board to play a reinvigorated role, especially as advisor and intermediary.

The steering committee believes the board should continue to remain presidentially appointed, but its composition should be bipartisan. Membership should also be expanded to include, on a rotating basis, the head of one of the major national higher education or scholarly associations. The board would also be immeasurably helped by the addition, ex officio, of prominent international leaders. (U.S. law prohibits presidential appointment of non-U.S. citizens.) Finally, the board ought to include at all times several members who are former Fulbright grantees.

Although the board would continue its responsibility for final selection of grantees, it should rely on cooperating entities and staff to minimize the decision time for this function, and devote almost all of its efforts to broader substantive issues and to making recommendations to the Administration and the Congress. The steering committee recommends that the reshaped J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board:

• Review USIA/State and others' efforts to upgrade evaluation measures.

• Consult regularly with the higher education community regarding its concerns about Fulbright and international exchange programs and bring foreign policy officials into more regular contact with educational leaders.

• Make a special effort to review and report to the Congress on steps being taken to streamline the Fulbright Program and introduce new technologies.

• Work with USIA/State and the national Fulbright Association and regional affiliates to develop a charter of ideas for Fulbright community service and to enhance alumni and public awareness and engagement through periodic public events here and abroad.

• Develop, with the new cultural and educational affairs bureau at State, concepts, procedures, and appropriate authorization to carry out fund-raising activities for special or pilot Fulbright projects or supplementary activities.

• Review with USIA/State and binational commissions steps to augment funding from other governments and ways in which binational commissions can reduce costs and raise funds.

VIII. Maintain the Program's Independence and Flexibility; Strengthen Coordination of U.S. International Exchanges

WE RECOMMEND that the Fulbright program's independence and flexibility be maintained in the transition to the State Department, that the Fulbright program serve as an exemplar of successful cooperation with non-governmental organizations, and that consolidation lead to stronger coordination of federal international exchange programs.

The recently announced consolidation of foreign affairs agencies poses issues and new possibilities for the conduct of U.S. international educational exchange activities, most notably the Fulbright program. Until 1977-78, these activities were administered by the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs in the Department of State.

The Department should provide the support and mandate to preserve the special character and operational needs of Fulbright, taking care to maintain its open communications networks, and foster partnerships that rely on the non-governmental sector. There remains a critical need to view the Fulbright program not as tactical in nature but as strategic, with long-term results.

The steering committee therefore recommends that the Department of State:

• Retain the separate appropriation of exchange activities including Fulbright to guarantee their budgetary and program integrity.

• Organize meetings involving the Foreign Scholarship Board, representatives of higher education, and senior Department of State and USIA officials to explore the needs and opportunities for the Fulbright program in the Department.

• Maintain the highly important corps of American civil and foreign service officers stationed in the U.S. and overseas as well as foreign national employees who carry out the exchange programs abroad.

• Assure the continuing availability to the exchange programs of an open and unclassified communications platform and flexible use of telecommunications to increase cooperation with varied organizations in the U.S. and globally.

Additionally the Department and USIA should:

• Examine a range of policy steps to provide supplemental financing or offsets for Fulbright, such as tax liability relief for grantees, tax credits for donations to Fulbright programs, and pilot "debt for educational exchange" measures.

• Upgrade an inter-agency working group (currently being established by USIA) under the aegis of the Department of State to a federal international education exchange coordinating council, chaired at the Under Secretary level, or at least the Assistant Secretary level.

USIA has long been responsible for coordinating U.S. government international educational exchange and training activities, but has been able only to gather information on other agencies' exchange efforts. The Department of State should be able to exert greater authority in working with other agencies to reduce duplication and address gaps. The Congress and the Administration appear to agree that coordination is needed of the $1.6 billion annual international exchange activities of 38 federal agencies. In response, USIA has taken steps to establish a small coordinating staff that could act as a secretariat for a coordinating council. (Appendix E provides a sample of prominent federal and non-governmental programs.)

Beyond information gathering and coordination, the new council should be proactive in support of U.S. educational and research cooperation abroad. The council should serve as a forum for U.S. international relations and domestic agencies to discuss international issues and trends and exchange and training responses.

A Final Word

The central value of Fulbright has been a high-quality international exchange of students and scholars that has built understanding and cooperation. J. William Fulbright established this program because he believed in something very fundamental:

The preservation of our free society in the years and decades to come will depend ultimately on whether we succeed or fail in directing the enormous power of human knowledge to the enrichment of our own lives and to the shaping of a rational and civilized world order.

This report seeks to honor the initial intent of the Fulbright program and to make it a responsive, active force for rational, positive change in the twenty-first century. The challenge for the next 50 years is for individuals and institutions in the U.S. and abroad to help Fulbright achieve its historic goal.