This article reviews the 15 years of research development efforts of the Institute for the Advancement of Social Work Research (IASWR); delineates IASWR's roles in relation to the social work practice, education, and research communities; presents the transdisciplinary and transorganizational partnerships in which IASWR engages to influence…

Institutions that have organized and centralized their data enjoy an obvious advantage in grappling with strategic planning and other issues. As the drumbeat for accountability, planning, and demonstrating effectiveness to internal and external stakeholders intensifies, the stature and importance of institutional research offices on most campuses…

The Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) is committed to bringing together museums and libraries across the country for conversations dedicated to developing a better understanding of the roles of libraries and museums as providers of public service to communities. The Future of Libraries and Museums in the 21st Century Planning…

This book fills a significant void in the research on ethnic minority cultural centers, offers the historic background to their establishment and development, considers the circumstances that led to their creation, examines the roles they play on campus, explores their impact on retention and campus climate, and provides guidelines for their…

The momentum of the individual rights movement has placed such an emphasis on individual claims and needs that all the nation's institutions have become suspect. These include churches, the family, and schools--those structures that mediate between the individual and the impersonal megastructures of society. These institutions are part of the…

Discusses the addition of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration database to the National Science Foundation's NSFnet data communication network. Outlines the history of databases in the United States and enumerates proposed upgrades from a new Office of Science and Technology policy report. (TW)

This paper discusses the role that the Office of Institutional Research and Strategic Planning played in providing data support, planning, and cohesiveness as Utah Valley Community College worked to become Utah Valley State College. The two tier model adopted at Utah Valley State College aspires to describe a cost-effective four-year college with…

In preparation for the Seventh Regional Consultation Meeting on the Asian Programme of Educational Innovation for Development (APEID) in June 1981, some of the eminent educators in Asia and the Pacific were invited by the Asian Centre of Educational Innovation for Development (ACEID) to present their thoughts on APEID. This document contains…

Educational organizations, this paper asserts, are best described using a neorationalist model, which analyzes organizations as social instruments, acknowledges structural conflict, and views individuals as active participants. The paper examines traditional and modern rationalist organization theories and contrasts these with systems theory; it…

A brief history of research involving humans is followed by discussion of the use of students in university research projects and institutional responsibility to students and the public. Institutions are encouraged to incorporate specific controls into research policies to avoid legal problems in the areas of contract theory, fiduciary…

The first paper in this collection summarizes 21 years of research into reading and presents a list of developments in the field and their implications for practice. The developments include: (1) reading is a process influenced by the text and the purpose; (2) the developmental context in which literacy is acquired is important, as is the…

The focus of this brief is student success: To what extent can the accreditation process drive significant improvement in student persistence and completion at institutions that undergo the peer review process, particularly for students from groups traditionally underrepresented in higher education? Because this inquiry is in service to Achieving…

A 1994 meeting to discuss current stresses on the university research system brought together faculty and administrators from 13 research institutions, federal research-sponsoring agencies, members of Congress, and interested professional association and philanthropic foundation representatives. Participants acknowledged that the system of…

This paper examines the role departmental chairs play in curriculum planning, who is chosen to lead the process, the behaviors used, and the complementary or conflicting roles played by other faculty members. Data for the analysis were drawn from interviews with 44 department chairs and 83 faculty in Carnegie classification institutions; these…

This paper recounts the legal, political, and educational changes in former East Germany as the nation has become reunified, and considers the implications of reunification for institutional research at East German universities. After a brief sketch of legal, geographic, and demographic highlights, the decrepit conditions of East German university…