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other offices of the Department. This is heartening. However, the Commission is impressed with the need for policy responsibility for the information activities on a world-wide basis to remain centralized in the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs.

CONCLUSIONS

(1) Events in the past year have made a United States Government information program more important than ever. The Commission feels that every opportunity for expansion should be embraced immediately.

(2) To make the program effective at home, the most important step is to close the gap in policy between other parts of the Department and the information area.

(3) The budgetary recommendations which have been sent to the Congress for this program for 1950 are a bare minimum for continuing the beginning which has been made.

(4) To improve the effectiveness of information by radio we should increase its physical facilities in order to strengthen its signal and provide more medium-wave relay bases; increase the number of broadcasts; improve the attractiveness of American programs; and increase the number of radio officers in countries that have large national networks. Wherever possible we should endeavor to buy time on local radio stations.

(5) Visual materials (motion pictures, displays, and exhibits) should be carried to the small towns, villages, and rural areas and this can be done most effectively and efficiently with mobile units.

(6) There is a great need for more motion pictures of a documentary and informational character and the procurement of language adaptation of films should be rapidly and substantially increased.

(7) Funds for travel and entertainment are very limited and an increase in these funds may very well be one of the best investments that could be made. It is impossible to do a good information job without doing at the same time a good public-relations job.

(8) In a few key cities of the world we do not have a wireless monitoring service. Such a service should be established for reception of the wireless bulletin and it is vitally important that the bulletin be translated into the languages of the various countries.

(9) There is a great need for additional regional offices and branch libraries to be established outside the capital cities.

(10) The dissemination of American private media abroad is primarily and essentially an informational activity and the responsibility and funds for this activity should be placed with the Department of State, and the activities should not be limited to the countries receiving aid under the European Recovery Act.

III. FIRST SEMIANNUAL REPORT OF ALL EDUCATIONAL EXCHANGE ACTIVITIES CARRIED ON FROM JULY 1 TO DECEMBER 31, 1948

DEPARTMENT OF STATE,

THE UNITED STATES ADVISORY COMMISSION

ON EDUCATIONAL EXCHANGE, Washington 25, D. C., February 4, 1949.

To the Congress of the United States:

The United States Advisory Commission on Educational Exchange submits with this letter its first semiannual report of all educational exchange activities carried on from July 1 to December 31, 1948, under the authority of the United States Information and Educational Exchange Act of 1948 (Public Law 402, 80th Cong. (62 Stat. 6)).

The report is required by section 603 of Public Law 402 which provides that its contents shall include appraisals, where feasible, as to the effectiveness of the educational exchange program, and such recommendations as shall have been made by the Commission to the Secretary for effectuating the purposes and objectives of Public Law 402 as well as the action taken to carry out such recommendations. Insofar as practicable the Commission has fulfilled these requirements in the attached document which contains information concerning:

(1) Organization of the Commission on Educational Exchange. (2) National and international progress through educational exchange.

(3) The financial level and its inadequacies. (4) The Department of State's conduct of the educational exchange program-general appraisal and recommendations.

(5) Other action taken by the Commission on Educational Exchange.

(6) The Department of State's execution of certain sections in Public Law 402 which resulted from amendments to the original bill.

HARVIE BRANSCOMB, Chairman.
MARK STARR, Vice Chairman.
KARL TAYLOR COMPTON, Member.
HAROLD WILLIS DODDS, Member.

MARTIN R. P. MCGUIRE, Member.

INTERNATIONAL EDUCATIONAL EXCHANGE,
JULY 1 TO DECEMBER 31, 1948

(Semiannual report to the Congress of the United States by the U. S. Advisory Commission on Educational Exchange on activities carried out under the direction of the Secretary of State under the authority of the United States Information and Educational Exchange Act of 1948 (Public Law 402, 80th Cong.).)

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ORGANIZATION OF THE COMMISSION

Direct public participation in the execution of national policy for the educational exchange program of the Department of State was initiated on July 12, 1948. The President on that date appointed the members of the United States Advisory Commission on Educational Exchange as representatives of American education, culture, science, technical endeavor, and public service in general, to advise and assist the Secretary of State in the conduct of the program. The members and officers of the Commission, as well as the periods of their appointments are given as follows:

Chairman: Bennett Harvie Branscomb, chancelor, Vanderbilt University-3 years (designated as Chairman by the President). Vice Chairman: Mark Starr, educational director, International Ladies Garment Workers Union-1 year (elected vice chairman by unanimous vote of the members).

Karl Taylor Compton, president, Massachusetts Institute of Technology-2 years.

Harold Willis Dodds, president, Princeton University-2 years. Martin R. P. McGuire, professor, Catholic University-1 year. Dr. Karl T. Compton resigned from the Commission in October upon his appointment as head of the Research and Development Board of the National Military Establishment. He agreed to continue to serve, however, until his successor could be appointed and qualified, assuming that this would be done promptly.

Following its initial meeting on September 10, 11, and 12, the Commission met for 2-day sessions in October, November, and December being governed in its proceedings by operating procedures and bylaws established in accordance with section 602 of Public Law 402. Secretariat services are provided by a small unit established for this purpose by the Department of State.

NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL PROGRESS THROUGH EDUCATIONAL

EXCHANGE

The program of educational exchange authorized under Public Law 402 constitutes a new type of Government activity which supplements the traditional conduct of diplomatic relations with a more direct contact between peoples. It is a program in which, under the guidance of a clearly defined national policy and with the assistance of governmental agencies, the American public can and will take a major part.

The story of mankind and its development presents irrefutable evidence of the results of the exchange of knowledge and ideas. The United States in itself stands as the best example of the benefits to be derived. In fact, it is a source of our strength that we number among our people all the major religions, races, and national origins. Our culture, science, and institutions are products of the intermingling of peoples from all nations. Continued exchange of experience, ideas, and persons between this country and others is a condition of our future progress and of theirs.

The ec

educational exchange program takes on added importance in today's world. International disaster has been averted by United

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States money, materials, and political help to a world made insecure by war and postwar conflicts. We have invested heavily in world recovery. We are assisting war-ravaged countries to become selfsupporting so that they may contribute their share to world prosperity. This means that we must share our knowledge, experience, and skills as a way of helping other countries to help themselves. The recovery program will have no permanent value if, at its close, the nations who have received our aid lack the trained technicians and other personnel to carry on the economic programs which we helped them start. Furthermore, unless we take positive action to insure the free mind, our efforts at world stability will be used as a powerful weapon against us. Anti-American forces are engaged in an offensive to distort and attack the principles and motives of the United States. They will win this struggle if men are kept in ignorance of our true purposes, policies, and culture.

The United States is also investing heavily in military preparedness to insure national security. Ideas are also weapons-weapons which can be utilized only by educational exchange. The free mind and free flow of ideas and knowledge among peoples provide such powerful weapons for peace that only when we review the progress of mankind itself can we measure their potentialities.

There is a widespread impression that educational exchange activities can accomplish only long-range results. This is incorrect; their effect is both immediate and long range. The great majority of exchanges involve adults in positions of active leadership-professors, specialists, technicians engaged in research, mature leaders in important fields such as journalism and the processions, leaders of labor organizations, and others whose impact upon the attitude of their respective countries will be immediate as well as long continued. Further, the very initiation of an exchange project in a given country has an immediate influence in that country since it indicates American intent to cooperate in a positive manner.

Other phases of the educational exchange program give evidence that the activities have immediate as well as lasting impact. The United States libraries are a particularly clear illustration of this. Thirty percent of the users are educators or journalists who come to our libraries seeking specific information about this country. Within a matter of hours this information is imparted to others through classrooms, lecture halls, and newspapers. Other users are doctors, lawyers, scientists, industrial workers, and farmers who obtain from the libraries facts and figures about American know-how for immediate use in their offices, factories, and farming projects.

Nongovernmental groups and organizations have done an extremely effective job in the international exchange of knowledge. This must continue. It is equally essential, however, that Government assume its rightful share of the responsibilities. In fact, there are certain functions which, because of their inherent nature, can only be performed by the Government. While the funds expended by the Government represent but a small fraction of the total-both public and private the services rendered in assisting and facilitating private agencies are indispensable to the program as a whole.

Through enactment of the United States Information and Educational Exchange Act of 1948 (Public Law 402) on January 27, 1948, the

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Congress carefully and deliberately determined that a program of educational exchange shall become an essential part of the conduct of this Nation's foreign affairs. This basic policy has thus been established. However, the act did not provide the funds to implement it.

THE FINANCIAL LEVEL AND ITS INADEQUACIES

The Information and Educational Exchange Act authorizes a world-wide program but does not finance it. Funds have not yet been appropriated to expand this program beyond the level at which it was operating at the time the act was passed.

When this act was passed, certain educational exchange activities were being carried on by the Department of State and other Federal agencies assisting the Department. In Latin America a modest program of cooperative interchange with countries of the Western Hemisphere was under way-a program providing for interchange of scientific, technical, and cultural knowledge and skills. This program, authorized by Public Law 355, cooperation with the other American Republics, has been in effect for 10 years. However, for the rest of the world, which the Department of State conveniently refers to as the Eastern Hemisphere, activities were limited to the maintenance of libraries established during the period of World War II by the Office of War Information, to the awarding of a few exchange-of-persons grants from emergency funds, and to a program of stimulating and assisting the educational exchange activities of private organizations and other governments.

Current operations

Public Law 402 is now almost a year old. For reasons just stated, we find the educational exchange program operating at approximately the same financial level and in the same areas of the world as in the years prior to the enactment of Public Law 402. No governmentsupported educational exchange activities are yet being conducted under the Smith-Mundt Act in the Eastern Hemisphere, except for the world-wide library operation and the work done in our missions and in this country to facilitate exchange activities of private organizations and other governments.

A review of the Latin-American program has convinced the Commission that the activities are sound and that they are making possible the effective exchange of knowledge and ideas between the people of this country and those of other nations in the Western Hemisphere. The program consists chiefly of various cooperative scientific and technical projects to which this country contributes scientific personnel and technical training, exchange of persons, the maintenance of a number of libraries and cultural centers, aid to American-sponsored schools, and other activities of a supplementary character. The Department of State is assisted in the conduct of this program by the 25 Federal agencies which are members of the Interdepartmental Committee on Scientific and Cultural Cooperation.

Major scientific and technical projects under way in 30 different fields of activity include agricultural collaboration, rubber development, agricultural statistics and census, civil aviation, coast and geodetic surveying, weather investigations, industrial training in technical and organizational skills, public health, public administration, and

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