Research documenting a trend (long known by professional economists) that economics professors and policymakers have been trained at a relatively small number of institutions is attracting attention from outsiders looking in. The following 1961 memorandum written by the head of the M.I.T. economics department, Robert L. Bishop, provides evidence of the strength of that department already in 1961 to attract the lion’s share of Woodrow Wilson Fellows in economics. This pattern would be later observed over the coming decades in the graduate school choices of National Science Foundation graduate fellows in economics.
The history of economics quants will have even more things to keep them busy when they turn to factors such as (i) of the relative quality of the inflow of graduate students and (ii) the educational “value-added” of the “top” programs.
In the meantime Economics in the Rear-view Mirror will add artifact by artifact to the pool of evidence.
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Establishing 1961 as the likely year of Bishop’s memorandum
Robert Bishop (below) wrote: “This year we are the initial first choice or eighteen applicants.” Cf. 1961 MIT President’s report
“This year, too, M.I.T. was selected as first choice by more Woodrow Wilson Fellows in economics — eighteen out of eighty — than any other school in the country.”
Robert Lyle Bishop was head of the economics department 1958-1964.
John T. Norton served as acting dean of the graduate school in 1961
Robert Solow went to work at the Council of Economic Advisers as a senior economist 1961-62.
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To: John Norton and Committee on Graduate School Policy
From: Robert L. Bishop
Subject: Second-year Fellowships Out of Woodrow Wilson Funds
For the purpose of immediate discussion, I should like to submit this brief recapitulation of the major points that I made in our conversation yesterday.
- The most important question of policy from the point of view of the Institute as e whole concerns the award of these fellowships to engineering students. There are several questions in my mind about this practice: (a) Has this been done in previous years? If so, I think it must have escaped the attention of our representative on C.G.S.P., since I feel sure he would have protested. (b) Has the Woodrow Wilson Foundation been asked whether they approve this practice, since engineering is a specifically excluded field for Woodrow Wilson Fellowships? I strongly doubt that they would approve, and I am convinced that the Institute should seek their approval before beginning or continuing this practice. Even if the Foundation is neutral on the question, however, I think that the practice Is inadvisable for reasons given below.
- Originally, as you know, the humanities and social sciences were the only eligible field for Woodrow Wilson Fellowships. Several years ago, when the program was greatly expanded, certain scientific fields such as mathematics, physics, chemistry, and biology were included. After one year on this basis, hoverer, the sciences were placed under a specially restrictive quota, mainly because N.S.F. Fellowships (usually more attractive than Woodrow Wilsons) were available in those fields. This helps explain why the great majority of Woodrow Wilson Fellows at M.I.T., both at present and prospectively, are in economics rather than in the sciences.
- This year there are eleven Woodrow Wilson Fellows in economics and only one in the School of Science. This is an abnormal disproportion, but economics is at least likely to have a majority of M.I.T. Woodrow Wilson Fellows in the visible future. Last year our department was the first choice of fourteen applicants initially, and we ended up with eleven fellows (because of some rejections and after several switches in and out). This year we are the initial first choice or eighteen applicants.
- The high proportion of M.I.T. Woodrow Wilsons in economics contrasts With thirty per cent of second-year fellowships awarded out of Woodrow Wilson funds to economics students.
- In general, fellowships are very important in our department because, with few exceptions, we are unable to give either teaching or research assistantships to first-year or second- year graduate students. Furthermore, in our area N.S.F. fellowships are available only to mathematical economists, who represent a minority of our graduate students. The availability of N.S.F. Fellowships to scientists and engineers, and on a comparably generous basis at all levels of graduate study, means that other departments at M.I.T. do not have the same kind of need that we have for second-year fellowships out of Woodrow Wilson funds.
- The present Institute practice is especially prejudicial to our department in relation to its competitors at other universities. Our chief competitor is Harvard, which has the only other economics department with comparable numbers of Woodrow Wilson Fellows currently. Our other significant competitors include California, Chicago, Yale and Princeton. These other economics departments all belong to divisions of their respective universities in which most If not all other departments have at least roughly comparable numbers of Woodrow Wilson Fellows. Hence these other departments have normal expectations that second-year fellowships out of Woodrow Wilson funds will go to their own students in roughly the same proportion as in the first year.
The availability of second-year fellowships is obviously a vital concern to the Woodrow Wilson Fellows themselves in deciding where to do their graduate work, and this is a question that some of them ask specifically. Clearly, the present Institute practice means that Woodrow Wilson Fellows in economics at M.I.T. would have an appreciably lower chance of receiving second-year fellowships than they would at the predominantly liberal arts universities.
- Our problem is all the more acute because, unlike such schools as Harvard, California, and Chicago, we have an appreciably more selective admissions policy. That is to say, we have enjoyed a remarkable increase in both the quantity and quality of applicants in recent years; and, since we have not expanded our numbers, we admit only people who would normally stand in the top half or higher of most other departments. Secondly, we have tightened our own grading standards and now give fewer A’s and more B’s, C’s, etc. than before. This year’s regular first- year graduate students, for example, have an aggregate cumulative slightly less than 4.3. In view of our selective admission policy, this means that students with cumulatives of 4.4 or 4.2 are still doing a highly creditable job, even though they are in the vicinity of the median of their own group. This to why we Feel that current Woodrow Wilson Fellows with such cumulatives deserve renewals of their fellowships.
- I apologize for the last-minute character of this plea. I should explain that the tentative decisions of the Scholarship Subcommittee come to us as more of a shock than they perhaps should, because — in Robert Solow’s absence –we thought that Institute policy on this question was nearer to our expectations then it has proved to be. For example, Solow said in his parting memorandum, which listed the eight present Woodrow Wilson Fellows whom we were to recommend for second-year fellowships, “If we do not get these, I would like to hear about it right away, because strong protest is in order.”
I should say finally, that we have several other non-Woodrow Wilsons whom we would have recommended for second-year fellowships, except that we felt — and thought it was general policy — that Woodrow Wilsons should have priority for renewals provided that they performed creditably.
Source: M.I.T. Archives. MIT Department of Economics. Records, 1947- (AC 394), Box 4, Folder “W”.
Image Source: Cropped portrait of Robert L. Bishop from the M.I.T. Museum website. Colorized by Economics in the Rear-view Mirror.