that Senator Benton and Encyclopaedia Britannica and its associated enterprises have made to education in the United States, and indeed, throughout the world.

We are looking forward to hearing from you, sir.

STATEMENT OF JAMES PARTON AND A. N. FELDZAMEN, PRESIDENT, ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA EDUCATIONAL CORP., CHICAGO,

ILL.

Mr. PARTON. Thank you very much for the very gracious introduction, Congressman Brademas. It is an honor to be here with you and Mr. Hansen and the staff on this extremely important measure.

I have with me Dr. Alvin N. Feldzamen, who is vice president and editorial director for films and publications, and, therefore, the creative head of our enterprise and in the best position to answer subsequent questions.

Senator Benton asked me to apologize profusely for not being here himself. He is on his way to Europe, but he was here last week and the paper we are submitting on his behalf runs to 22 pages. I can assure you that he sweated over every word of it, and is wholeheartedly behind it.

Since it is so long, it seemed to me that to be courteous I would excerpt it and summarize it, rather than read the whole document which can be digested at leisure.

Mr. BRADEMAS. Without objection, the entire statement of Senator Benton will be included at this point in the record and I hope you will feel free to excerpt it, Mr. Parton.

(The statement referred to follows:)

STATEMENT OF WILLIAM BENTON, CHAIRMAN AND PUBLISHER, ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA, INC., AND THE ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA EDUCATIONAL CORP., CHICAGO, ILL.

Mr. Chairman and members of the subcommittee, my name is William Benton. I am Publisher and Board Chairman of Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., and of the Encyclopaedia Britannica Educational Corporation.

Among the subsidiaries of the former are the G. & C. Merriam Company, the nation's largest dictionary publisher, and Library Resources, Inc., a new ultramicrofiche publisher specializing in reference collections for libraries.

The Britannica companies produce basic reference works, including encyclopedias, dictionaries, and atlases, which appear in virtually every school and library-and are found in the homes of millions of families.

In addition, the Encyclopaedia Britannica Educational Corporation has the specific purpose of producing innovative educational materials for use in the nation's schools; in addition to books and book collections, these include educational motion pictures, filmstrips, transparencies, multimedia programs, and other audio-visual instructional aids in the "software" category which are being increasingly used in schools both here and abroad.

Thus, the primary business of all the Britannica companies is education across a broad spectrum of school and home application, and an equally broad range of media and methods.

For this reason we have the greatest interest in the proposed National Institute of Education, and are grateful for the opportunity to testify in these important hearings.

Moreover, my own personal lifelong interest in education, and attention to its needs and progress, may also be measured by the fact that I am a trustee of six colleges and universities, served as vice-president of the University of Chicago for eight years, and for six years as the United States Ambassador to UNESCO, In fact, my mother and father were professors, as were my wife and my uncles and aunts.

So, my entire life has been spent in the vineyards of education, and this has been a dominant theme of much of my own labor and thought.

First, let me begin by heartily commending the wisdom and thoroughness of the Subcommittee in holding hearings on this subject in Chicago. For this city is truly the center of a major segment of the industry that produces and distributes the educational materials used by the American child in school, and his teacher.

Many of the foremost textbook companies, the leading producer-distributors of educational classroom films and filmstrips, distinguished reference book companies, important private proprietary and correspondence schools, manufacturers of "hardware" such as motion picture projectors and educational television equipment-all are located within the greater Chicago region to such an extent of educational product diversity and quantity, and of depth of usage in the schools, that this area probably rightly considers itself the "capital" of educational materials production in the United States.

Furthermore, the American Medical Association, American Bar Association, American Dental Association, the National Congress of Parents and Teachers (The National PTA), and other associations with a vital interest in American education make their national headquarters in Chicago.

The Britannica companies, then, are proud to join our distinguished colleagues in these organizations in welcoming your Subcommittee to Chicago! A large number of able and knowledgeable witnesses have already testified before this Subcommittee in support of the proposed National Institute of Education. This is my intention as well.

I hope to keep my statement brief-but also to raise a few points that may have been insufficiently stressed in earlier testimony, or that may be new matters for consideration. There are some important respects in which we disagree with other witnesses and spokesmen for this legislation, despite our basic agreement with its purpose.

1. ENTHUSIASTIC ENDORSEMENT OF THE IDEA OF THE NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF EDUCATION

Rarely has a proposed new federal agency received such unanimous, wholehearted, and bipartisan support as the proposed National Institute of Education.

From the first proposal for this Institute by the President in early 1970formalizing an idea which had long been gaining support among a broad consensus of educators and social commentators-approval has come from all concerned with education, and from all regions of the nation. It is easy to see why.

The vast public expenditures for education by federal, state, and local Governments-the unease among many of our minority groups about the education their children are actually receiving-a new, highly articulate and perceptive group of critics of the shortcomings of American education-all add weight to the need for an appropriate mechanism to serve as "a focus for educational research and experimentation in the United States," as the President has proposed.

We do not join those who insinuate such an Institute has been proposed as a means to diminish federal activity in those programs that have proven of such value to American education in recent years.

Such a disingenuous view should not be consonant with the principles of the many members of the Congress, from both parties, who are supporting this legislation.

We do not believe it is the intention of the Administration or the Congress to use the National Institute of Education as a device to reduce federal support for vital educational programs. We know neither the Administration nor the Congress would wish to throw the passengers overboard, while the scientists and designers seek improvements in the functioning of their vessel.

There is no doubt that an adequate focus for educational experimentation. research, development, and information dissemination is long overdue. In many areas especially as applied to those projects funded by the Federal Government-substantial savings, as well as improved educational effectiveness, may and should result.

For example, one question that has been of particular interest to my companies is concerned with the relationship between motion picture films and learning.

Some experiments tend to suggest little relationship-and others strongly support our belief in the validity of motion pictures for education.

This should not be a question of merely academic interest to the Federal Government, since tens of millions of dollars of federal funds have been spent to support the production of educational films.

How should such a question be approached? Have some film programs been poorly conceived and executed? When these have been tested, have the experimental design and achievement tests used been valid?

Despite much dedicated labor by psychologists and educators, our knowledge of testing is very rudimentary. This is a point-the validity of educational testing-to which I will return in a moment.

The uncertainty surrounding this simple question of educational methodology is but one example of the many important issues with which the proposed National Institute of Education is to deal. If it is successful, we can certainly anticipate substantial progress towards educational improvement-and not incidentally, the saving of millions of federal dollars that, we are now told, may be misspent in research and development without proper direction.

A susbtantial part of the current research, development, and evaluation of edu cational materials is, at present, conducted by private, commercial companies, such as ours-another point to which I will later refer. Let me give you one example, a study called Project Discovery.

Here the Encyclopedia Britannica Educational Corporation provided a rich abundance of audi-visual materials, especially films and filmstrips, and the Bell & Howell Company provided appropriate equipment for their use, to schools in California, Ohio, Texas, and Washington, D.C. Here, more than 230 teachers and 5,100 elementary pupils participated.

With Britannica audio-visual materials, more than 75 percent of the teachers reported being able to teach several complex ideas with more success than before, and more than 60 percent reported being able to teach subjects they could not teach before, because formerly they did not have the materials to do the job. In fact, more than half the teachers admitted that they themselves had gained knowledge of their subjects from these films and filmstrips!

We are pleased by these results, but they are only a tiny step in the need for more knowledge about educational practices.

How should film or other learning materials be created and used for education? What is the proper role of book media?

Of television?

How can these be improved?

The questions are endless and fascinating. But they are not merely academic. With the current strains on our educational system-and the budgets for them-the validity of the proposed National Institute of Education becomes increasingly evident.

2. PROPOSAL FOR A "PRESIDENT'S COUNCIL OF EDUCATIONAL ADVISORS" The National Institute of Education is proposed as an agency of the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare-and quite rightly so.

However, as an indication of the importance to our nation of the future of our educational systems, I would like to suggest that consideration be given to augmentation of the President's staff by the creation of a "President's Council of Educational Advisors."

Just as the office of the President is now strengthened by the inclusion within it of the Office of Science and Technology, and by the Council of Economic Advisors, may it not be also strengthened in the area of education by such an educational council?

In fact, just as witnesses have testified that the proposed National Institute of Education is "shamelessly" modeled after the National Institutes of Health, let me suggest that a new "President's Council of Educational Advisors" be modeled after the existing council of economists.

This suggestion was first advanced in the late fifties by a committee, which I (that's Senator Bentor) had the honor to chair, whose members were Senator Harris (then head of the Department of Economics at Harvard), Philip Coombs (then Chairman of the Research Division of the Ford Foundation), Beardsley Ruml, and Walter Heller.

We took as our model the Council of Economic Advisors (which was established by the Full Employment Act of 1946), and recommended that such a

Council of Educational Advisors issue an annual report on the state of educa. tion and its progress during the previous year.

And that this report be submitted to a joint committee of the Congress, to be established along the lines of the Joint Committee on the Economic Report. This structure appealed to us the committee whose membership I listed above more than ten years ago, and it appeals to me still.

It would provide the proper Presidential support, and the proper Congressional review, of the workings of the proposed National Institute of Education.

I strongly recommend further consideration of this proposal by your Subcommittee, and by the Congress and the Administration.

3. REAFFIRMATION OF FAITH IN THE AMERICAN EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM

The past five years have seen a rising chorus of complaint about the American educational system. The critics are numerous, well-intentioned, articulate, and zealous. Much of their work has been of the greatest value in stimulating our adult population, so many years removed from the classroom, to look at our school practices with fresh eyes. And the results are clear: a fresh approach to educational practice is evident, and new methods such as the "open classroom," even the open school, programmed learning, new systems of teaching reading, new multi-media instructional systems, Sesame Street, and many other forward steps are being taken.

Perhaps the critics have, in totality, been overzealous. The broad educational picture in the United States, seen from proper perspective, is not as dismal as one would gather from the recent popular literature on this subject.

The fact remains that of all the major nations of the world, our educational system provides more learning to a greater proportion of its citizens than any other. Despite the deficiencies of our schools and colleges-and these we must seek to overcome our system is the best and most broadly based in the world. We are all distressed, for example, by the violence in our schools and colleges. And many consider this an "educational" problem.

Yet the critics who bring this to our attention-and speak of favorable learning situations in other nations-find it convenient to ignore the fact that we have seen similar violence among young people in many other nations in recent years— nations with such diverse educational, political, and economic systems as Japan, Egypt, Mexico, France, China, Germany, and other countries.

This phenomenon of violence and lawlessness among the young cannot, therefore, be attributed to specific features of the American educational system.

We also hear much about the conservation among the schools, and their resistance to innovation. It is true we have a large and somewhat inflexible school system. It does take years or decades to achieve educational change. Yet those who urge rapidity or change might do well to pause and reflect upon the many new educational proposals advanced during the past decades-many now obvious, in hindsight, as patently absurd. Would they have wished these to have been rapidly instituted in the schools?

The balance between preservation of the traditional and valuable, and acceptance of the new and promising, is not all one-sided. Everything old is not bad, and everything new is not good.

Most of our judgment on these matters must depend on the collective experi ence and knowledge of those on the firing line, the teachers and administrators in our schools. There are millions of these working professionals in the schools now, and tens of millions have served in the past recent decades. A high proportion are dedicated professional men and women whose stature and importance have never been recognized fully in American society. Most of them are not working in education for money or self-aggrandizement, but because they love education. Many work long hours, often under trying conditions, in one of our noblest professions.

How shall we value their collective experience and judgement?

Is it not true that these teachers and administrators have, in fact, provided the major actual “evaluation laboratory" for educational practice?

In our time of rapid communication, can it be maintained that they will be unwilling to adopt efficient and sensible innovation? I do not think so.

Two telling points in this connection were made earlier in testimony before this Subcommittee by Dr. Gideonse that do bear repeating.

First, he noted that educational research-as distinguished from research in the physical, natural, or biological sciences-is inseparably connected to questions of human choice and value. For progress here, then, we must depend

on the collective values and good sense and judgment of the practitioners of education, the teachers and administrators in the schools.

Second, Dr. Gideonse noted the dangers of the concept of a "delivery system" in which separated experimenters or academic experts, removed from the schools, would research and develop new methods of instruction that would then be "handed down" to the practitioners in a one-way flow. This system will not be successful.

Certainly educators "will tend to resist the low status implications of being on the receiving end of the system; academics and scientists in turn will tend to find confirmed their latent suspicions concerning the professional motives and competencies of the 'natives they have come to save'."

I think Dr. Gideonse's testimony bears careful study as the Institute is formed. An important place-an equal place to all other disciplines-must be afforded the working teachers and administrators within the Institute. Otherwise it is unlikely to become more than another remote, uninfluential center for behavioral and social psychologists. In a sense, the teachers and administrators in our schools must be a central, decision-making part of the Institute.

4. IMPORTANT ROLE OF THE EDUCATIONAL MATERIALS PRODUCING INDUSTRY Many witnesses before this Subcommittee, and other commentators on education, have referred to research and development in other fields-space, transportation, the health fields, and so on.

We have all heard a good many times of the disparity between the relative research funds spent in these fields, and in education. And from these data, comparisons are drawn about progress and achievement, comparisons that are disparaging to education, but made with the best of motives: namely, to improve the funding of educational research.

Yet few of these commentators have taken the two necessary additional steps in this analogy. First, it must never be forgotten that progress in transportation, space, the health fields, and every other example that can be cited favorably, has not been achieved without the vital participation of private industry.

Whether it is construction of new aircraft, space vehicle components, research on drugs by the pharmaceutical companies, fertilizers and pesticides in agriculture, or whatever-a substantial part of the progress of recent decades in these so-called "more successful" fields has been due to private enterprise companies, often working together with Government agencies, universities and research laboratories.

In American education, the significant private companies are the producers of educational materials-textbooks and reference books, motion pictures and other audio-visual devices, and so on.

This is one further step in the analogy that, I believe, must be made if the Institute is to succeed. For the very same reasons that it is not, in general, feasible or appropriate for Government agencies to build airplanes, I believe it would not be appropriate or feasible for the Institute to function without close and harmonious relations with the private companies that today provide educational materials to the schools.

There are opportunities for flexibility, freedom, and achievement that are available in our society only to private companies. Such has been the successful pattern in these other oft-cited fields. So should it be also for the Institute.

I note that the proposed legislation, H.R. 33, does in fact contain this provision in Section 4, that "The Secretary, through the Institute, shall conduct educational research . . . assist and foster such research, collection, dissemination, or training through grants, or technical assistance to, or jointly financed cooperative arrangements with, public or private organizations, institutions, agencies, or individuals . . ." (emphasis added).

I stress this point because-this is the second step in the extended analogy— it is a simple, indisputable fact that the bulk of current educational development is actually a matter undertaken today by private industry.

The educational materials you and I used in school, and those by our children today, come from private companies. These are not inferior materials, in general. They are produced by professional people, subject to keen competition in school adoption and purchase, and refined through many years of actual use in the schools.

I reject utterly the notion that most of our textbooks, films, and other educational materials are of poor quality. The process by which they are made and