NSF Support for Mathematics Education

Abstract

The National Science Foundation Act of 1950 created a new Federal agency with two principal missions: providing needed support for basic scientific research and increasing both the quality of instruction in science and the number of scientists trained. The first mission was to encourage broad classes of fundamental research comparable to that which various agencies had used to accomplish military objectives in World War II, which ended five years earlier. War experience had shown the frequent dependence of applied research and development upon previous basic research often done by scientists or mathematicians when no definite applications were apparent. The mission in science education resulted in part from the rapid growth of education following the return of the veterans and the support of the GI bill. This growth was imposed upon a base of depleted faculty, many of very marginal qualifications, and outmoded equipment and curricula in the sciences. Also the booming postwar economy and rapid advances in science and technology had accelerated the need for well trained scientists and engineers.