AC, and The Price of Devisiveness
The phasing out of the Advisory Council on College Chemist,ry by the National Science Foundation is an action that brings no credit to chemistry or to the RSI". I t comes a t a t,imc when creative revitalizat,ion of chemistry i~istructionis bot,h immirient and urgent-a time when the pressures for change have awakened a somewhat preoccupied chcmical community to t,he nccessitp of enliveuing it,s courses and its t,caching; a time when funds invested are most likely t,o bring the greatest returu. I t comes as a result of understand:lblc impatience :~nd unpardonable imprudence by chemist,^ aud NSl" st,:iff alike. I t serves to emphasize the difficulty in tearing down mou~~t,ains of cherished ttradition and productive cducntional procedure in favor of c r e d v c and cxcit,ing hut untested and unprcdict:hle new patterns of instruction. And it brings t,o the surface many of the scisms t,hat unrertaint,y, pride, and arrogance have created in the academic community ovcr the ymrs. I n deciding to tcrminatc AC8 the NSI' staff explains that it was motivated in part by a group of prcdomnantly negative rcvicws, presumably by chemist,^, of the Council's proposal for cont,inuat,ion of support through 1971, and in part by its own iritcntion to close out :dl such commissions in t,he near future. The wisdom of termi~rat,ingthe commissions a t a time when "educi~tionin the scicuces" needs all the help it can gct is cert,ainly qoestionahle; the imprudence of responding as it did to the highly controversial rcvicws of the AC, proposal would seem to placc NSF in an untenable posit,ion a t best. Careful reading of the extrack of the rcvicwers' cornmeuts supplicd by the SSI? staff leaves two inemapahlc imprcssious. Thc first is that few if any of thc reviewers were sufficiently familiar with the activities aud operation of ACs to comment mith authorit,y on what it had done or was liliclp to accomplish. The second is t,hat nearly all of the rcviewcrs actually believe that given the kind of support provided, the AC1 should have brought about a major breakthrough in chemical cducation during its six years of cxistcncc and, since it has not fathered such a dcvelopmcnt, its work is of questionable value to chemistry. We are stimulated to raise two questions in response to these reviewers' comment,^. The first is: Would any editor of any scientific journal or ally committee evaluating proposals for rcsearch support accept as expert evaluation of n manuscript or a research proposal reviews th:it so clearly tcst,ify to the limit:ttions of the reviewers as most of these? Thc second question is: Given a set of educational procedures as well established, as well nourished, arid as successful as college chemistry instruction has heen in this count,ry over thc past fifty years, arid givcri a lcvcl of research support that clnims
1 editorially I speaking the major energies and interests of an overwhelmiug majority of academic chemists, is it realistic to expect, that a strategy of instant breakthrough by a national commission could be successful? Wc believe that both the chemists who revieyed the ACa proposal and the NSF staff that responded to the reviews owe a good deal more to chemical cducat,ion than these unfortunate effortsrepresent. However, the AC3 itself would seem to he a good deal more like Caesar's mist,resses than likc Caesar's wife in all this-willing, it appears, to settle for a contented status somewhat more below innocence than above suspicion. There have been a few excesses in ACI nctivities; on occasion the leadership has seemed cspccially relaxed; oric or two conferences h:wc not been productive; the effort from counselors has not always been what might be expected; the select ion of cou~iselors probably could have hccn handled more ohjectivcly; t,he Stanford office hils been a problem at times; as always there have been more complainers than contributors. Nevertheless the record is clear. Talmi on balance the AC3 has had and will cont,inuc to have a profound influence on undergraduate chemical edncation. I t has produced valuable materials mid information for teachers and studeuts in a11 varieties of undergraduate institut,ioos, and it has used every device short of violence to get chemistry teachcrs to look a t what it has produced. Taxpayers would he fortunate indeed if every tax dollar brought as good a return ns those invested here. Letters and personal testimony from hundreds of tcachers attest to AG1s success. A requcst for let,ters of support would show how deep the feeling runs on this matter. The Council has adequate funds to continue its work for another year, a ~ it.~ has d reccntly reorganized with :L view toward cont,inuation beyond that time. Hopefully the continued support will bc forthcoming, pernaps under condit,io~isthat require the 1c:rdcrship to he more accouiitablc to t,hc chemical education community a t large than under the prcscnt arrangement. Such support is vit,al to the continuing healthy development of chemistry arid of sciei~cc,and this development is clearly consistent with national goals and priorities. Every chemist in this country should he greatly concerr~edovcr the at,titudcs that led scvcr:~lof t,hc rcviewcrs to comment with such obvious IILCII of sophisticatio~ion the activities of ACB and mith u c h insensitivity to the long rnuge needs of chcnristry. Every chemist also should be conccrued lrst d~visivcness within the community of chemists be m:uiifcstcd hy ' O'CI1inequitahlc treatment of chemistry by 11:ition:rl .t, cies. The profession of chemistry caunot st:utd this kind of thing much longer. NTL
Volume 46, Number 5, Moy 1969
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