Societal Outcomes from Research and Public Service

Research and public service as conducted in higher education are for the most part produced jointly with instruction. Scholarship is primarily the work of faculty members who constantly study, review, synthesize, analyze, criticize, and expound received knowledge. Higher education is deeply involved in the natural sciences. University research also provided the knowledge base for unleashing and harnessing nuclear energy, a spectacular though controversial achievement. In judging the outcomes from academic science, one approach is to consider the progress of natural science in the United States in view of its relatively heavy reliance on higher education as a focal point of basic research. The economic returns from research and development are another source of evidence about the role of higher education in the advancement of technology. One final bit of evidence on the outcomes from scientific research is supplied by Edward Denison in his monumental studies of the sources of economic growth in the United States.