The Fund honors Robert M. (Bob) Hauser, who retired in late 2016 as Executive Director of the Division of Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education (DBASSE) of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine – a milestone in his 30 years of volunteer and staff experience with the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.
Bob argued that the end-point of a National Academies' committee project is not a Report—it is its impact. And impact requires sustained and targeted efforts to reach relevant decision-makers, translation of the implications for a variety of different audiences, and facilitating discourse among researchers, policymakers and practitioners. But funds aren't always available for this kind of outreach. The specific goal of the Hauser Fund is to ensure that social science analysis and synthesis has a better chance to guide informed policy decisions across the DBASSE portfolio—national statistics, science education, children’s well-being, criminal justice, environmental change, the implications of aging, among others. Donations help fund targeted policy briefings, articles or Op-eds in select media, short videos and other communications products, and special symposia to connect the nation’s leading social and behavioral scientists with decision-makers.