Teaching Humanity; In our globalized world, an arts education is more crucial than ever as a way to cultivate sympathy for others.

(Copyright (c) Newsweek, Incorporated - 2006. Reproduced with permission of copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.)

Nussbaum is the Ernst Freund Distinguished Service Professor of Law and Ethics at the University of Chicago.

We live in a world that is dominated by the profit motive--which suggests to concerned citizens that education in science and technology is crucially important to the future success of their nations. I have no objection to good scientific and technical education, and I don't wish to suggest that nations should stop trying to improve it. But I worry that other abilities, equally crucial, are at risk of getting lost in the competitive flurry. The abilities associated with the humanities and the arts are also vital, both to the health of individual nations and to the creation of a decent world culture. These include the ability to think critically, to transcend local loyalties and to approach international problems as a "citizen of the world." And, perhaps most important, the ability to imagine sympathetically the predicament of another person.

This essential ability can be called the narrative imagination: it leads us to be intelligent readers of other people's stories and to understand their emotions and wishes. The cultivation of sympathy was a central public task of ancient Athenian tragedy, and thus a key element in ancient Greek democracy; it has also informed the best modern ideas of progressive education in both Western and non-Western traditions. (American John Dewey and Rabindranath Tagore in India had very similar ideas about the importance of arts education.) One of the best ways to cultivate sympathy is through instruction in literature, music, theater, fine art and dance.

Each culture--indeed, each student--has blind spots: groups within it or abroad that are especially likely to be treated ignorantly or obtusely. A good arts education will select works specifically to promote criticism of this obtuseness, and a better vision of the unseen. Ralph Ellison, in an introduction to a new edition of his 1952 novel "Invisible Man," wrote that such a novel could be "a raft of perception, hope, and entertainment," on which American culture could "negotiate the snags and whirlpools" between us and our democratic ideals. Through the imagination we can have insight into the experience of another group or person that it is difficult to attain in daily life--particularly when our world has constructed suspicions and divisions that make any encounter difficult.

To cultivate our students' "inner eyes" we need carefully crafted instruction in the arts and humanities, which will bring students into contact with issues of gender, race, ethnicity and cross-cultural experience. The arts also instruct students in both freedom and community. When people put on a play or a dance piece together, they learn to cooperate--and find they must go beyond tradition and authority if they are going to express themselves well. The sort of community created by the arts is nonhierarchical--a model of the responsiveness and interactivity that a good democracy will also foster in its political processes. And, not least, the arts can be a great source of joy. Participating in plays, songs and dances fills children with happiness that can carry over into the rest of their education.

Moreover, this element of joy--of sheer fun--can help the arts to offer a venue for exploring difficult issues without crippling and counterproductive anxiety. As radical artists have often emphasized, the arts, by generating pleasure in connection with acts of cultural criticism, promote an endurable, even attractive, dialogue with the prejudices of the past, rather than an argument fraught with fear and defensiveness.

Education in sympathy is doing quite well in the place where I first studied it: namely, the liberal-arts curricula of U.S. college and universities. (This part of the curricula particularly attracts philanthropic support, since wealthy people remember with pleasure the time when they read books they loved and considered issues with open minds.) Outside the United States, many nations whose universities do not include a liberal-arts curriculum are now striving to build one: they acknowledge its importance in crafting a public response to the fear and suspicion in increasingly pluralized societies. I've been involved in such discussions in the Netherlands, Sweden, Germany, Italy, India and Bangladesh.

But liberal education has high financial and pedagogical costs. Such teaching needs small classes, where students get copious feedback on frequent writing assignments. European professors are not used to this idea--and would now be horrible at it if they did try; they've come to expect that holding a chair means not having to grade undergraduate writing assignments. (This is also true in parts of Asia.) And even where faculty are keen on the liberal-arts model, bureaucrats can be unwilling to support enough teaching positions required to make it work. The University of Oslo, for instance, has introduced a required ethics course for first-year students, but it is taught as a lecture to 500 people, with a multiple-choice examination at the end. This is worse than useless. It gives students the illusion that they have actually had some philosophical education, when they have had only a gesture toward such learning.

At Sweden's new urban university, Sodertorn's Hogskola, where many students are immigrants, the faculty and the vice-chancellor badly want a liberal-arts curriculum based on preparation for democratic citizenship. They have sent young faculty to U. S. liberal-arts colleges to study and practice small-class teaching, and they have constructed an exciting course on democracy. As yet, however, they do not have enough teachers to run the small sections that are crucial if the class is to succeed. Only in small idiosyncratic institutions, such as the Utrecht Institute for Humanist Studies and the European College of Liberal Arts in Berlin, is the liberal-arts idea a reality in Europe.

Democracies have great rational and imaginative powers. Yet they also are prone to irrationality, parochialism, haste, sloppiness and selfishness. Education based mainly on profitability in the global market magnifies these deficiencies--to the point that they threaten the very life of democracy itself. We need to favor an education that cultivates the critical capacities, that fosters a complex understanding of the world and its peoples and that educates and refines the capacity for sympathy. In short, an education that cultivates human beings rather than producing useful machines. If we do not insist on the crucial importance of the humanities and the arts, they will drop away. They don't make money. But they do something far more precious: they make a world worth living in.

Sowing Seeds; From Cornell in Qatar to Monash in Malaysia, satellite campuses are a booming business.

(Copyright (c) Newsweek, Incorporated - 2006. Reproduced with permission of copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.)

The campus architecture suggests Arabia, and the surrounding sands stretch to the horizon. But for 350 students, this is a tiny patch of Scotland in the Dubai desert. They'll receive their degrees from Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, educated largely by a faculty who speak in British accents. "Our university was created to serve a developing country--Scotland--180 years ago," says Brian Smart, the Scottish professor who heads the local faculty. "We thought, 'Let's take the same model and plug it into other countries around the world'."

These days that's hardly an original thought. With backing from the Dubai government, a cluster of overseas colleges--from India's Mahatma Gandhi University to the St. Petersburg State University of Engineering and Economics--have set up outposts here in the Knowledge Village since it opened in 2002. Nor is Dubai the lone gulf state pursuing a role as an academic hub. Local students looking for a U.S. education can train at Cornell's medical school or Georgetown's school of foreign service, both in Qatar's Education City. Indeed, the trend is global: Britain's Nottingham University has a branch near Shanghai, the Rochester Institute of Technology has one beside the Mediterranean in Croatia, and Australia's Monash University has one in Malaysia.

Forget the days when a coveted foreign degree meant costly travel and a few years away from home. Today it's often the institution--not the student--that moves. Since 2000, the number of branch campuses worldwide has roughly doubled to about 80, as more colleges tap into the growing demand for a prestigious Western education; foreign satellite campuses have become a small but fast-growing segment of the $30 billion international-education industry. America still dominates this market, but other providers--notably the British and the Australians--are pushing in. All are realizing that it makes sense for universities to invest in bricks-and-mortar facilities close to the richest markets, namely in Asia and the Middle East. Says Line Verbik of the Observatory on Borderless Higher Education, a London-based research group that monitors education trends: "What we are seeing is a really big increase both in the number and diversity of players."

And this is a game in which all players can win. Students receive a high-prestige education for maybe half the cost of going to Europe or North America. Rapidly growing economies like India and China get top-rated schools to plug the gaps in their own educational systems. Countries looking to a future without oil or natural gas get a few big-name foreign universities--and the research facilities that accompany them--to help build a knowledge-based economy that won't depend on finite natural resources. Small wonder, then, that aspiring nations now vie to attract the right foreign schools. Inducements can be lavish. Qatar, for example, pays not only for the shiny new buildings but also for staff bonuses. Governments know that the best colleges bring the best recruits, including those from neighboring states, whose tuition contributes to the economy. By 2012, for example, Singapore hopes to pull in 150,000 outside students--three times the 2002 total. The bait: a list of branch campuses from world-renowned schools ranging from the French-based business school Insead to the Technical University of Munich and MIT.

For their part, the incoming institutions get the chance to internationalize their reputations and build a global brand. "Sitting here in the United States, we see the world changing and evolving, with economic development moving to the Pacific, and we would like to be part of that world," says Mark Kamlet, provost of Carnegie Mellon University in Pennsylvania, which has a second base in Qatar. A stint overseas gives the teaching staff a broader international perspective as well as the chance to scout for possible postgraduate talent, while home students welcome the possibility of study overseas at a familiar institution.

A well-run college can also make a handy ambassador in corners of the world where the West is suspect. "This is a good way for the United States to represent itself overseas, particularly in Arab countries where in the past most of the trade has been in guns and oil," says Antonio Gotto, dean of Weill Cornell Medical College, which opened its Qatar campus in 2003. The school now attracts students--70 percent women--from across the Middle East including Syria, the Palestinian territories, Iraq and Iran.

To be sure, managing cross-cultural relations can be tricky. When money is involved, host nations want returns. Only last month, Singapore announced it was cutting off funds to a biomedical-research facility from Baltimore-based Johns Hopkins University, claiming that it had failed to meet performance targets. "We cannot justify the continuation of public funding for a collaboration that has failed to yield results for Singapore," said Andre Wan of the government's science-and-technology research agency. College bean counters with long memories will also remember an overenthusiastic expansion into Japan in the '80s--followed by a spate of campus closures due to culture clashes and disappointing enrollment figures.

Certainly, there may be easier ways for universities to earn cash. Many Western institutions now offer their degrees through franchise arrangements with local partners, and the spread of the Internet has broadened the opportunity for distance learning. But standards can easily slip without the regular controls that go with an on-the-ground presence. And establishing a permanent campus abroad demonstrates faith in the host country's future. "A branch campus is about commitment--not just renting out your name," says Stphan Vincent-Lancrin, an expert on higher education at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in Paris.

There are some powerful financial imperatives at work these days. Tight-fisted governments are pushing the state-funded universities of Britain and Australia, for instance, to raise more cash for themselves. The inflow of foreign students--once a dependable source of extra revenue--can no longer be guaranteed, thanks to rising competition among countries for high-paying nonresidents. Enterprising colleges in Germany and the Netherlands have even introduced more coveted English-language instruction to lure foreigners. The number of Chinese students taking up places at British universities fell 21 percent last year, due in part to growing opportunities closer to home.

Given such obstacles, exporting education can seem more practical than importing students. "We are grateful for foreign students who come here, but we are competing with top international universities, and that competition is going to get tougher and tougher," says Douglas Tallack, a professor at Britain's Nottingham University. His university's solution: an outpost in Malaysia and a partnership with a Chinese corporation that has created a 38-hectare campus close to Shanghai--complete with a near-replica of Nottingham's neoclassical central building. Student numbers are rising fast and should reach 4,000 within five years. When it comes to education, location isn't everything; provenance is.

Wanted: Foreigners; Universities are competing to attract the best, brightest and richest students.

(Copyright (c) Newsweek, Incorporated - 2006. Reproduced with permission of copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.)

With Akiko Kashiwagi in Tokyo

Students who want to obtain their degrees abroad have never had more options. For decades, the best, brightest and richest typically chose between Oxbridge and America's top universities. No longer. Recognizing the windfall that foreign students bring, countries including New Zealand, South Africa, the Netherlands and Japan have begun stepping up efforts to attract them.

They're fighting over a big pie. Of the estimated $30 billion international-education market, the United States earns about $13 billion. In Britain, Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown has said that education is the country's fastest-growing source of export income. UNESCO estimates that more than 2.5 million students study overseas each year, and that number is "definitely growing," says Peggy Blumenthal, executive vice president of the Institute of International Education. By 2025, 7.5 million students are expected to seek education outside their home countries.

With tighter visa restrictions and high fees creating obstacles for foreign students in America and Britain, other countries are reaching out. The Netherlands now teaches more than 50 percent of its master's programs in English, and has boosted recruitment efforts abroad. "With the government funding educational-information centers and a strong presence at international student fairs, this is a push," says Bernd Wachter, director of the Academic Cooperation Association in Brussels.

In New Zealand, the number of international students jumped from about 4,000 in 1999 to more than 21,000 in 2004, with the country earning an estimated $1.2 billion off them. Last year the government announced it would spend an extra $3 million to promote the industry.

Even Japan is reaching out to nonnative students. In 2004, Tokyo's Waseda University launched the School of International Liberal Studies, where a quarter of the students are foreign and all classes are taught in English--except Japanese studies. Recruiters have targeted reputable high schools from South Korea to Singapore. Already three times more foreign students have applied than could matriculate. "This is one way for Japan's higher education to become globally competitive," says Dean Katsuichi Uchida.

America and Britain are fighting to hang on to their share of the market. "Continental Europe used to see marketing education as dirty, but schools are starting to say, 'We have to be more proactive to compete'," says Wachter. If they don't go after foreign students, someone else will.

World of Knowledge; From their student bodies to their research practices, universities are becoming more global.

Levin is the president of Yale University.

As never before in their long history, universities have become instruments of national competition as well as instruments of peace. They are the locus of the scientific discoveries that move economies forward, and the primary means of educating the talent required to obtain and maintain competitive advantage. But at the same time, the opening of national borders to the flow of goods, services, information and especially people has made universities a powerful force for global integration, mutual understanding and geopolitical stability.

In response to the same forces that have propelled the world economy, universities have become more self-consciously global: seeking students from around the world who represent the entire spectrum of cultures and values, sending their own students abroad to prepare them for global careers, offering courses of study that address the challenges of an interconnected world and collaborative research programs to advance science for the benefit of all humanity.

Of the forces shaping higher education none is more sweeping than the movement across borders. Over the past three decades the number of students leaving home each year to study abroad has grown at an annual rate of 3.9 percent, from 800,000 in 1975 to 2.5 million in 2004. Most travel from one developed nation to another, but the flow from developing to developed countries is growing rapidly. The reverse flow, from developed to developing countries, is on the rise, too. Today foreign students earn 30 percent of the doctoral degrees awarded in the United States and 38 percent of those in the United Kingdom. And the number crossing borders for undergraduate study is growing as well, to 8 percent of the undergraduates at America's Ivy League institutions and 10 percent of all undergraduates in the U.K. In the United States, 20 percent of newly hired professors in science and engineering are foreign-born, and in China the vast majority of newly hired faculty at the top research universities received their graduate education abroad.

What are the consequences of these shifts among the highly educated? Consider this: on the night after the attacks on the World Trade Center, Jewish students at Yale (most of them American) came together with Muslim students (most of them foreign) to organize a vigil. Or this: every year the student-run Forum for American/Chinese Exchange at Stanford (FACES) organizes conferences in both China and at Stanford, bringing together students from both countries chosen to discuss Sino-U.S. relations with leading experts. The leaders of student groups promoting international collaboration are in touch with each other daily via e-mail and Skype, technologies that not only facilitate cooperative projects but also increase the likelihood of creating lifelong personal ties. The bottom line: the flow of students across national borders--students who are disproportionately likely to become leaders in their home countries--enables deeper mutual understanding, tolerance and global integration.

As part of this, universities are encouraging students to spend some of their undergraduate experience in another country. In Europe, more than 140,000 students participate in the Erasmus program each year, taking courses for credit in one of 2,200 participating institutions across the continent. And in the United States, institutions are mobilizing their alumni to help place students in summer internships abroad to prepare them for global careers. Yale and Harvard have led the way, offering every undergraduate at least one international study or internship opportunity--and providing the financial resources to make it possible. Universities are also establishing more-ambitious foreign outposts to serve students primarily from the local market rather than the parent campus. And true educational joint ventures are gaining favor, such as the 20-year-old Johns Hopkins-Nanjing program in Chinese and American Studies, the Duke Goethe executive M.B.A. program and the MIT-Singapore alliance, which offers dual graduate degrees in a variety of engineering fields.

Globalization is also reshaping the way research is done. One new trend involves sourcing portions of a research program to another country. Yale professor and Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator Tian Xu directs a research center focused on the genetics of human disease at his alma mater, Shanghai's Fudan University, in collaboration with faculty colleagues from both schools. The Shanghai center has 95 employees and graduate students working in a 4,300-square-meter laboratory facility. Yale faculty, postdocs and graduate students visit regularly and attend videoconference seminars with scientists from both campuses. The arrangement benefits both countries; Xu's Yale lab is more productive, thanks to the lower costs of conducting research in China, and Chinese graduate students, postdocs and faculty get on-the-job training from a world-class scientist and his U.S. team.

Yale has a similar facility at Peking University in Beijing, where Prof. Xing-Wang Deng directs a program studying the biology of plant systems, aimed at improving crops. Like Xu, Deng is a graduate of the institution where he performs his research. But it is only a matter of time before China starts to set up similar facilities for outstanding foreign scientists who have no prior connection to the country.

Given NEWSWEEK's rankings, it's not surprising that nations seeking advancement are looking closely at America's research universities as a model. Since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, technological change has been the principal source of economic growth and a rising standard of living. But in the past half century, technological progress has become dependent on scientific advances and their translation to practice--a process that requires both public and private investment. After the second world war, the United States recognized that maintaining its leadership in defense technology required substantial public investment in university-based science. By the mid-1950s the United States had designated public support for university research for the basic sciences as well as for health, agriculture, defense and energy.

As a result of its strength in science, the United States has consistently led the world in the commercialization of major new technologies, from the mainframe computer and the integrated circuit of the 1960s to the Internet infrastructure and applications software of the 1990s. The link between university-based science and industrial application is often indirect but sometimes highly visible: Silicon Valley was intentionally created by Stanford University, and Route 128 outside Boston has long housed companies spun off from MIT and Harvard. Around the world, governments have encouraged replication of this model, perhaps most successfully in Cambridge, England, where Microsoft and scores of other leading software and biotechnology companies have set up shop around the university. An impressive array of technology companies already surrounds some of the major campuses in China--notably Peking and Tsinghua universities in Beijing, and Fudan and Shanghai Jiatong universities in Shanghai.

Universities are also adapting more American research practices. Until recently, for instance, Japan allocated research funding in block grants, which wound up in the hands of the country's most senior--but not necessarily most productive--professors. But between 2000 and 2004, the country increased the volume of grants subject to competitive review by 57 percent, in an effort to direct funding to the more meritorious.

Even more-dramatic changes are taking place in China, where a number of leading universities, intent on attaining world-class status, have been carefully studying America's top institutions for new ideas. These include widening the search for new faculty well beyond their own graduates, establishing rigorous standards for awarding lifetime tenure and consulting with independent experts on personnel decisions. Several leading universities have ditched the traditional specialized undergraduate curriculum for a year or two of general education followed by free choice of a major field of study, as is common in the United States. Some are experimenting with using criteria other than national exams to admit students. And many elite universities are determined to abandon recitation in favor of classroom interaction that encourages students to think independently--a hopeful sign for those eager to see a fully democratic China.

Indeed, China is intent on playing all its cards. By investing heavily in research, tripling university enrollments between 1998 and 2004, and encouraging top students to think independently, the country is self-consciously using its universities as a means to stimulate economic growth. At the same time, since Deng Xiaoping first permitted Chinese students to seek education in the West in 1978, no country has made a more deliberate effort to send its most talented students abroad for a top education--especially at the graduate level. Today, in contrast to 10 or 20 years ago when economic opportunity was limited at home, most Chinese students return after graduation--often with an appreciation of the values of a free society and a greater understanding of the countries where they studied.

Europe, by contrast, has lost its competitive edge. According to "The Future of European Universities: Renaissance or Decay?" a devastating recent critique by Confederation of British Industry Director General Richard Lambert and Nick Butler, Chief of Strategic Planning at British Petroleum, European governments have systematically weakened their top universities, once the pride of the world. They have invested too little in research, spread limited resources across too many institutions, expanded enrollments without increasing faculty and refused to allow universities sufficient autonomy, the report says. To flourish, they need to concentrate more resources in the hands of the strongest universities and allow them to generate revenue by charging tuition fees like their U.S. counterparts--and awarding financial aid to those in greatest need.

For all its success, the United States remains deeply ambivalent about sustaining the research-university model. Most politicians recognize the link between investment in science and national economic strength, but support for research funding has been fitful and sporadic rather than steady. The budget of the National Institutes of Health doubled between 1998 and 2003, but has risen more slowly than inflation since then. Support for the physical sciences and engineering barely kept pace with inflation during that same period; legislation to double these expenditures in 10 years is currently pending. The attempt to make up lost ground is welcome, but the nation would be better served by steady, predictable increases in science funding at the rate of long-term GDP growth, which is on the order of inflation plus 3 percent per year.

American politicians have great difficulty recognizing that admitting more foreign students can greatly promote the national interest by increasing international understanding. Adjusted for inflation, public funding for international exchanges and foreign-language study is well below the levels of 40 years ago. In the wake of September 11, changes in the visa process caused a dramatic decline in the number of foreign students seeking admission to U.S. universities, and a corresponding surge in enrollments in Australia, Singapore and the U.K. Objections from American university and business leaders led to improvements in the process and a reversal of the decline, but the United States is still seen by many as unwelcoming to international students. An abortive attempt last year by the Commerce Department to extend the scope of export control regulations in university research labs reinforced this unfortunate signal.

Most Americans recognize that universities contribute to the nation's well-being through their scientific research, but many fear that foreign students threaten American competitiveness by taking their knowledge and skills back home. They fail to grasp that welcoming foreign students to the United States has two overriding positive effects: first, the very best of them stay in the States and--like immigrants throughout history--strengthen the nation; and second, foreign students who study in the United States become ambassadors for many of its most cherished values when they return home. Or at least they understand them better. In America as elsewhere, few instruments of foreign policy are as effective in promoting peace and stability as welcoming international university students.

Newsweek

Europe
"Why, we ask, do Americans continue to tolerate gun laws and a culture that seems to condemn thousands of innocents to death every year, when presumably, tougher restrictions, such as those in force in European countries, could at least reduce the number?"
—The Times of London, in an editorial delving into the American psyche and the gun laws across the nation

"It is a delusion … to imagine that controls on their own will stop the rise of gun crime, and the killing that results … what is needed is a wholesale shift in the national culture—and that will take rather longer than an arms ban."
—Mangus Linklater, The Times of London columnist

"There's only one real ‘freedom' in America—the freedom to kill one another… if guns weren't so readily available in the ‘land of the free,' this tragedy might never have happened."
—London's Daily Mail columnist Russell Miller

"There is such a high murder rate in the United States that even if you excluded the deaths caused there by the use of guns, their homicide rate would still be higher than ours. In other words, even if there were not a single gun in America, there would still be more murders and manslaughters than in Britain. Bringing gun control to America would not stop it being a country where a lot of people get killed."
—James Bartholomew, political commentator at the Daily Express in London

"[T]he response of many who wish America ill will have been gratuitous schadenfreude. They see a people who live by the gun also dying by it, be they Marines in Anbar province or students in Virginia…. How can American soldiers disarm Iraqi families of their weapons in Baghdad yet claim the right to arm themselves to the teeth back home?"
—The Guardian columnist Simon Jenkins

"In a country where ‘the right to bear arms' is written into the Constitution and where there are an estimated 192 million firearms, the problem isn't simply one of a particular interest group. After the tragedy, voices rose up to deplore the fact that professors and students are not authorized to arm themselves, since one of them could have neutralized the killer. With that kind of reasoning, America is not close to overcoming its violence."
—Excerpts from an editorial headlined "Tragédie Américaine," in France's Le Monde newspaper

"What is, for us, an archaism remains, for many Americans, a fundamental right, a right to remain armed, which is becoming more and more costly. That is the difference between us and them"
—Pierre Rousselin, from Paris's Le Figaro

"In France, we say everything ends in song. In the land of John Wayne, Charlton Heston and George Bush, a great partisan of the NRA, everything, individual anger, heartbreak, neighborhood disputes, quarrels between dealers or depression, ends in shootouts. That is why students die on campuses, without anyone, starting with Hillary Clinton, thinking to do anything much about it."
—Laurent Joffrin, writing in the French newspaper Libération

"In Virginia at the age of 13, you can buy a revolver at a supermarket."
—From the Italian newspaper il Messaggero, in an article headlined Pistole Facili (Easy Guns). Italian newspapers carried extensive comments from Marina Cogo and Giancarlo Bordonaro, two 23-year-old Virginia Tech students from Milan. Cogo is returning home, vowing not to return.

Iraq

"It is a big loss for the American people and I think that this is a message from Allah to them to stop and think of what is happening in Iraq. Thousands of Iraqis lost their sons or fathers and all of this was because of the so-called American democracy being exported to Third World countries."
—Haifa Salim, a 34-year-old Baghdad housewife

=======================================================

If, as I believe, we are part of the problem, then obviously we can be part of the solution.

BUSINESS REPORT

Executive Summary

The executive summary is a one-page summary of your report. It is typically read by managers or other people who may not have time to read your entire report. This document should present a broad understanding of the

• background for the report,
• purpose and scope of the report,
• major conclusions and recommendations made in the report.

It is important to know who will most likely be reading the executive summary, so that you can provide the level of information that your reader needs. In considering what to include in the executive summary, consider which ideas and facts are most important for conveying the significance that this report has for the organization, and make sure that those ideas are clearly stated in the summary.

(put the page number 1 inch from the bottom of the page)

Title Page

Distributed Learning Resources and Online Courses in Business and Technical Writing

(center the title of the report and situate the title approx. 2 inches from the top of the page; use a bold type in a large font--this example is in Georgia, 14-point)

Prepared for: Dr. Tilly Warnock, Director of Composition
Prepared by: Dr. Thomas Miller, Prof Comm Project Leader

(include the parties to whom the report is addressed in the "Prepared For" section and situate approx. in the middle of the page--if the report is external, include the organization name and address; use a font 2 points smaller than your title--this example is inGeorgia, 12-point)

January 10, 2001

(center the date and situate it approx. 2 inches from the bottom of the page; use a smaller font--this example is in Georgia, 10-point)

BUSINESS REPORT WRITING

Business Statistics

Introduction

As the business environment grows in its complexity, the importance of skillful communication becomes essential in the pursuit of institutional goals. In addition to the need to develop adequate statistical skills, you will find it necessary to effectively communicate to others the results of your statistical studies. It is of little use to formulate solutions to business problems without transmitting this information to others involved in the problem-solving process. The importance of effectively communicating the results of your statistical study cannot be overemphasized.

Unfortunately, it seems that many business managers suffer from inadequate communication skills. The December 1990 issue of the Training and Development Journal reports that "Executives polled in a recent survey decry the lack of writing skills among job candidates." A report in 1993 issue of Management Review notes the "liability imposed on businesses by poor writing sills." The report states that employers are beginning to place greater emphasis on communication in hiring practices. Many employers have adopted policies requiring job candidates to submit a brief written report as part of the screening process. An August 1992 issue of Marketing News reveals that "Employers seek motivated communicators for entry-level marketing positions." Obviously, the pressing lack of adequate writing and communications skills in American businesses is well documented.

Therefore, the purpose of this appendix is to illustrate some of the major principles of business communication and the preparation of business reports. We examine the general purpose and essential features of a report and stress the benefits of effective report writing. Emphasis is placed on the customary form a business report should take and the format, content, and purpose of its component parts. We will study illustrations of practical reports and the problems will provide the opportunity for students to develop and sharpen their communication skills.

The Need to Communicate

Most business decisions involve the cooperation and interaction of several individuals. Sometimes dozens of colleagues and co-workers strive in unison to realize mutual goals. Lines of communication must therefore be maintained to facilitate these joint efforts. Without communicating ideas and thoughts it would be impossible to identify common objectives and purposes necessary for successful operations. Without communication and the team effort it permits, the successful completion of any important project can be jeopardized. Some aspects of the project would be unnecessarily replicated while other tasks would be left unattended. Further, in the absence of adequate communication, colleagues would find themselves working at Coors purposes and perhaps pursuing opposing goals. What one team member may have worked to assemble one day, a second team member may dismantle the next. Without communication the chances for a successful outcome of any business endeavor are significantly reduced.

The Characteristics of the Reader

Business reports are quite often intended for a wide variety of different audiences. It is critical that you carefully identify the intended audience for your report, otherwise it is likely that your report will be misdirected and less effective. You should consider exactly what the readers of your report already know and what they need to know to make informed decisions.

You should also consider the attitude the audience will adopt toward your report. If you fear that the readers may be somewhat hostile toward your report, you may want to offer more supporting evidence and documentation that you would if their reception was thought to be more favorable. The educational background and work experience of the audience is also a key factor in the formulation of your report. A report written for top executives will differ considerably from the prepared for line supervisors in terms of style, word usage, and complexity. Even age, gender, and other demographic characteristics might serve to shape the report.

One thing is certain. Whether you earn your livelihood as an accountant, a marketing manager, a production supervisor, or a sales representative, you will work in a vacuum. You will find it necessary to constantly communicate with others in order to successfully complete your job. Generally speaking, the larger the institution in which you work, the greater will be the need to prepare written reports. As the organization grows in complexity, so does the required degree of formal communication.

The Purpose of Statistical Studies

Given the importance of communication, it should come as no surprise that the primary purpose of a report is to convey information. In this effort, statistical reports are fairly concise and follow a rather predetermined pattern. This familiar pattern permits easy recognition of the essential features and allows the reader to quickly comprehend the study. We will examine two types of statistical studies: Statistical reports and statistical abstracts.

These studies are quite similar to purpose and in the composition of their component parts. However, a statistical report is the result of a more complete and exhaustive study. Its focus is on complex issues that could affect the long-term future and direction of the organization. It is used when decisions such as plant locations, major capital projects, and changes in the product line are made. A statistical abstract, on the other hand, is used when the problem is of less complexity and consequences. Each of these is examined in detail.

Statistical Reports

To complete a statistical report you must isolate the problem and collect the necessary data. The population must be clearly identified and a sample carefully chosen. The researcher then conducts the study and prepares to report the results.

As noted above, the procedure to be followed in reporting a statistical study consists of rather precise and well-defined steps that may be modified only slightly. Immediately following the title page the statistical report provides an account of its conclusions and recommendations. In a business setting this opening statement is usually referred to as an executive summary.

Executive Summary

The intent of the executive summary is to immediately provide the time-constrained reader with the important facts and findings derived from the study. It summarizes these findings and conclusions, along with any recommendations, and places them at the beginning of the study. This placement provides easy access to the more important information relevant to any decision that a manager must make. If the manger is interested in any further details, he or she may consult the main body of the report.

The executive summary should be written in a non-technical manner. It is intended for upper-level managers whose expertise often lies in business management and not in technical fields such as chemistry, physics, or even, in many cases, statistics. They generally have little concern for the technical aspect of the report. They only want to be assured that you have considered all relevant business factors and followed proper scientific procedures in the formulation of the report. If the reader then decides a more complete technical explanation, he or she can read any additional portion of the report. The executive summary seldom exceeds one or two pages.

Although the executive summary precedes the main report when it is submitted in final form, the summary is written only after the study has been conducted and the rest of the report has been completed. The summary should include no new information not presented in the report, and should not offer conclusions based on data or information not contained in the report.

INTRODUCTION

The second step is a brief introduction describing the nature and scope of the problem. Any relevant history or background of the problem that is essential to a thorough understanding and provides clarification for the rest of the study should also be included. A statement is made explaining why the resolution of this issue is important and the critical need to formulate a course of action.

METHODOLOGY

The third section of a statistical report is more technical than the rest of the study, as it explains the exact nature of the statistical tests that you indeed to conduct. It describes in detail the precise quantitative tools and techniques to be used, and reveals the manner in which they will lead to the desired results. It is also customary to briefly characterize the data set and the manner in which the sample was taken. This will become familiar to you as you gain an increased understanding of statistical analysis and its many applications.

The methodology that you use will depend largely on what you want to accomplish. This fact too will become more evident as you gain more insight into the process of statistical analysis as described in this text.

Findings

It is here that the true statistical analysis is preformed. The findings consist of the actual statistical computations that provide the information required to make decisions and recommendations. These calculations may vary from simple descriptive techniques to the more advanced inferential analysis. The computations are shown in sufficient detail to reveal and validate the statistical test without providing needless information or becoming overly cumbersome.

In addition, comments regarding the computations are provided to note the results and draw attention to their significance. That is, the results of the computations are merely cited or quoted. No effort is made to discuss or interpret these computations. This is left for the next segment.

Discussion and Interpretation

Based on the findings from the he previous section, the researcher now woofers a discussion and interoperation of the report's major implications. The researcher should provide an interpretation of the findings in a meaningful and yet non-techincal sense. This section has a considerable impact on the formulation of the solution to the problem described in the introduction, which motivated the report.

Conclusions and Recommendations

This final segment often repeats some of the information found in the executive summary, yet allows the researcher to explain in greater detail how and why the conclusions were reached. A more complete discussion of the recommendations may also be included. It is important that this section be based on the results of the findings and not other conclusions or recommendations not supported by the analysis.

If reports are prepared in this organized form, they are inherently more useful and lend the researcher a sense of credibility and authority. The report will command respect from those who rely on it to make important decisions.

STATISTICAL ABSTRACT

The statistical abstract is used when the issue is less complex and does not have the long range implications associated with a statistical report. The statistical abstract is shorter and less formal that the report form. Unlike the statistical report, the statistical abstract is seldom accompanied by an executive summary. The less complex nature of the issue the abstract is to address makes such a formal summary unnecessary.

Other than the executive summary, the abstract contains essentially the same features as the report. However, the components parts of the abstract are much less detailed and shorter in length. The statistical abstract can sometimes be presented in a single page. The following discussion of the abstract's main components reveals that each resembles those found in the statistical report, but in somewhat abbreviated form.

Introduction

The introduction is a brief statement describing the motivation for the study. It explains what problem or concerns prompted the study and why the study is important. Little or no reference is made to historical developments as was the case with the report form.

Methodology

As with the report form, the methodological statement contained in the abstract describes in some technical detail the statistical tools and techniques that will be used to complete the study. This is perhaps the most technical component of the abstract. A brief description of the population and the manner in which the sample was taken is customary.

Findings

This section includes the actual statistical computations and implements the statistical tools described in the methodology section. Due to the less involved, less complex nature of the problem, this section may consist of only a few calculations, which will serve as the basis for the study's conclusion. Brief commentary is provided regarding the outcome of the computations.

Discussion and Interpretation

Relying on the findings in the previous section, the researcher presents a discussion of the study's findings and offers an interpretation. This interpretation translates the technical findings for those who are less trained in statistical procedures.

Conclusion and Recommendation

The abstract may be completed without a conclusion or any statement regarding recommendations. The study may have been requested by a superior who simply requires more information to make his or her own managerial decision. This superior may consider a recommendation for action as a usurpation of his or her administrative power. Remember, the abstract is used when the decision to be made is of lesser consequence; the decision can often be administered by a single authority. For this reason, a recommendation is not usually offered unless specifically requested.