Harvard to Establish Center To Study Nonprofit Sector
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Harvard to Establish Center To Study Nonprofit Sector
Excerpted from N.Y. Times, April 12, 1997
Harvard University has received a $10 million gift to establish a center to study the nation's fast-growing nonprofit sector, the 1.4 million charities, religious congregations, foundations, hospitals, educational and cultural groups that account for one of the most dynamic parts of the American economy.
Harvard announced the creation of its new center in April at a conference on nonprofit organizations at its John F. Kennedy School of Government, where the center will be based. More than a third of Kennedy school graduates now work for nonprofit groups, as opposed to 20 years ago, when three-quarters of the school's graduates found jobs in the Federal Government or state and local agencies, said Holly T. Sargent, the Kennedy school's associate dean for external affairs.
The new Hauser Center for Nonprofit Institutions is being named for its lead donors, Rita E. Hauser and Gustave M. Hauser, New Yorkers who are both Harvard Law School graduates. Joseph S. Nye Jr., the dean of the Kennedy school, said the Hauser gift was among the largest the school has ever received. He called the center "one of our most ambitious undertakings."
In founding a center on nonprofit organizations, Harvard joins more than 30 other American universities that have opened schools, departments or major programs focused on these groups, which provide an ever-growing number of jobs for Americans.
The nonprofit sector, often called the third sector, is the focus of renewed intellectual ferment.
Aaron Heffron, assistant research director of the Independent Sector, a Washington group that represents more than 800 nonprofit groups, foundations and corporate-giving programs, says the nonprofit sector has grown faster than either government or business in the past 15 years.
If Harvard has its way, the quality as well as quantity of nonprofit sector employees will grow; a Hauser Center priority is to give professionals who already work in this sector advanced training. Drawing on the resources of other Harvard departments and professional schools, five faculty members, four of whom will be recruited this year, will offer Kennedy School graduate students courses in nonprofit policy issues and managerial training.
Harvard is committed to raising $20 million to supplement the $10 million give from the Hausers. The money, among other things, will finance 10 to 15 full-time fellowships, and many more partial scholarships, for the center's students.
