Background

As part of various coalitions, AERA seeks to increase federal investment in education research specifically and in the social and behavioral sciences broadly. The pipelines through which federal research funding in education and the social and behavioral sciences include:

• Department of Education
  • Institute of Education Sciences
• National Science Foundation
  • Education and Human Resources (EHR) Directorate
  • Social, Behavioral, and Economic Sciences (SBE) Directorate
• National Institutes for Health
  • Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute for Child Health and Human Development (NICHD)

While these funding streams provided $1.78 billion in FY 2010, the SBE Directorate accounted for only 4.6 percent of research funding at NSF (3.7 percent of NSF’s overall budget), and the EHR Directorate accounted for 15 percent of the overall budget. The funding for IES of $659 million was 1 percent of overall discretionary appropriations for the Department of Education.

Trends in appropriations for education and social and behavioral science research have paled in comparison to funding at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Based on percentage change, NIH has seen an increase of 9 percent in appropriations between 2002 and 2010, compared with 22 percent for IES and 32 percent for the SBE Directorate of NSF. However, in terms of growth in budget figures, NIH has seen a $2.6 billion increase in that timespan, compared to $54 million in SBE and $121 million in IES.

The below graph shows the trends, accounting for inflation, in investments for IES and the SBE and EHR Directorates in NSF between 2002 and 2012.

The below chart lists President Obama’s FY 2013 proposed budget, which was released in Feburary, 2012.

AERA Action

As noted in AERA’s Report and Recommendations for the Reauthorization of the Institute of Education Sciences, IES has not benefitted from the increased investment seen in NSF or in NIH. As such, AERA included a recommendation to increase investment in education research to an amount equal to 0.5% of the national investment in K-12 education.

AERA has showcased the benefits of members’ NSF-funded work on Capitol Hill through its affiliation with theCoalition for National Science Funding. Presenters at the Annual Exhibition of CNSF include:

• Karen King’s research work in math education (2011)
• Richard Ingersoll’s research on math and science teacher shortages (2010)

Resources

Proposed FY 13 Budget

            Department of Education

• Institute of Education Sciences (figures)
  • Budget Justification

            National Science Foundation

• Social, Behavioral, and Economic Sciences Directorate (figures)
  • Budget Justification
• Education and Human Resources Directorate (figures)
  • Budget Justification

National Institutes of Health (figures)

• NICHD
  • Budget Justification