Richard C. Atkinson
Encyclopedia
Richard Chatham Atkinson (born 19 March 1929) is an American professor of psychology and academic administrator. He is the former president and regent of the University of California
system, and former chancellor of U.C. San Diego.
at Stanford University
, where he worked with Patrick Suppes
on experiments in which they tried to use computer
s to teach math and reading to young children in Palo Alto elementary school
s. The Education Program for Gifted Youth
at Stanford is a descendant of those early experiments.
Eventually, Atkinson transitioned from research to a career in administration, and went on to serve as Director of the National Science Foundation
, Chancellor of the University of California, San Diego
, and President of the University of California system.
Atkinson is widely recognized for his scientific, academic, and administrative accomplishments. He has been elected to the National Academy of Sciences, the Institute of Medicine, the National Academy of Education, and the American Philosophical Society. He is past president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, former chair of the Association of American Universities, the recipient of many honorary degrees. A mountain in Antarctica, and Atkinson Hall, the home of the California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology at UC San Diego, are named in his honor.
and his Ph.D. in experimental psychology and mathematics at Indiana University
, Atkinson joined the faculty at Stanford University in 1956. Except for a three-year interval at UCLA, he served as professor of psychology at Stanford from 1956 to 1975. He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
in 1974. His research on mathematical models of human memory and cognition led to additional appointments in the School of Engineering, the School of Education, the Applied Mathematics and Statistics Laboratories, and the Institute for Mathematical Studies in the Social Sciences. The theory of human memory which Atkinson put forward with his student Richard Shiffrin
has been influential in shaping research in the field of experimental psychology. Advances in computer-assisted instruction and methods for optimizing the learning process have been among the more applied outcomes of his theoretical interests.
In 1977, he received the American Psychological Association’s Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award.
During Atkinson’s tenure at NSF, skeptics in both Congress and the media mounted frequent attacks on government funding for basic research as little more than subsidizing idle curiosity about trivial topics at the taxpayers’ expense. This trend was aptly symbolized by Senator William Proxmire’s Golden Fleece Awards for waste and fraud in public programs, one of which went to NSF for a study of the sexual behavior of screwworm flies. As NSF director, Atkinson defended this and other projects—whose value Senator Proxmire ultimately acknowledged—as well as the long-term importance of fundamental intellectual inquiry. In the same vein, NSF conducted some of the early studies on the contributions of basic research to productivity and economic growth.
During his years at UCSD, Atkinson also followed a strategy of encouraging technology transfer and active involvement with industry, especially with the small, high-technology companies that were springing up around San Diego in the 1980s and 1990s, (such as Bien Logic
). The UCSD CONNECT program, self-sustaining but run by UC San Diego Extension, began in 1985. It was successful in helping aspiring entrepreneurs in high-technology fields find information, funding, and practical support on such crucial topics as writing a business plan, marketing, and attracting capital. It also acted as an advocate on public policy issues that affect business. UCSD's outstanding faculty, innovative research, and commitment to industry-university partnerships were major factors in transforming the San Diego region into a world leader in technology-based industries. Atkinson's role in this transformation was noted in a recent study of research universities and their impact on the genesis of high-technology centers (see Raymond Smilor, Niall O'Donnell, Gregory Stein and Robert S. Welborn, III, "The Research University and the Development of High-Technology Centers in the United States," Economic Development Quarterly, Vol. 21, No.3, August 2007, pp. 203–222).
He also sought to expand the University’s contributions to California’s productivity and economic growth through such efforts as the Industry-University Cooperative Research Program, which supports collaborative research in areas critical to the state’s competitive edge. The California Institutes for Science and Innovation, proposed by California Governor Gray Davis and established at four UC campuses, are aimed at creating the next generation of knowledge in high-technology fields through interdisciplinary research partnerships with industry.
Atkinson’s most important task as president, however, flowed from the July 1995 decision by the UC Board of Regents to eliminate racial preferences in admission. Under his guidance, UC embarked on an ambitious partnership with the K-12 public schools to raise the level of academic accomplishment among all California children. Within UC, the Academic Senate and the Regents approved his proposals for several new paths to undergraduate admission that moved UC closer to the comprehensive review of students’ records used by selective private universities. By the end of his tenure, UC was admitting more minority students than it was in 1997, the year before the ban on affirmative action took effect.
Under Atkinson's leadership, the University adopted a new academic freedom policy that clearly defined the central role of the faculty in protecting and promoting the freedom to teach, to do research, and to express and publish views in the context of the modern research university. He established the California Digital Library to expand access to UC's collections and to advance new forms of scholarly communication. UC established several new professional schools and began expanding its graduate enrollments. Enrollment in engineering and computer science—disciplines essential to the high-tech California economy—rose by nearly 70 percent, and total UC enrollment increased by a third, from 150,000 to 202,000 students. The University prospered during Atkinson's tenure. For the first time, private giving reached the billion-dollar mark in a single year, UC's state-funded budget nearly doubled, and federal research funds soared.
's SAT
I college entrance examination as a requirement for admission to the University of California. Students, he argued, should be tested on what they had actually achieved academically, not on the basis of “ill-defined notions of aptitude.” Atkinson’s challenge inaugurated a national debate on the relative merits of aptitude
versus achievement tests and ultimately led to a major revision of the SAT I. The new SAT I, introduced in 2005, incorporates higher-level mathematics and a written essay to reflect the quantitative and writing skills students need for success in college-level work.
As president, Atkinson had to face some of the most contentious and complex issues in American higher education, from achieving diversity to managing a multi-billion dollar budget greater than that of many states. He will be remembered for his skill in guiding the University into the post-affirmative action age and for the creative and energetic leadership he brought to the nation's most distinguished public university.
In 2005, the unnamed Sixth College
at UCSD
moved to name the college in his honor. Around April 27, 2005, UCSD students were notified that Dr. Atkinson had withdrawn his name from further consideration as the future namesake of Sixth College. The decision was an abrupt surprise as Atkinson only a week earlier had told The San Diego Union-Tribune
he would be "honored if the name were approved". Although student reception to the naming proposal was lukewarm, demonstrated opposition was generally meager with only conspicuous organized criticism by opponents desiring a more racially diverse name. The Perry scandal was not the subject of public criticism.
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University of California
The University of California is a public university system in the U.S. state of California. Under the California Master Plan for Higher Education, the University of California is a part of the state's three-tier public higher education system, which also includes the California State University...
system, and former chancellor of U.C. San Diego.
Career
Atkinson started out as a professor of psychologyPsychology
Psychology is the study of the mind and behavior. Its immediate goal is to understand individuals and groups by both establishing general principles and researching specific cases. For many, the ultimate goal of psychology is to benefit society...
at Stanford University
Stanford University
The Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University or Stanford, is a private research university on an campus located near Palo Alto, California. It is situated in the northwestern Santa Clara Valley on the San Francisco Peninsula, approximately northwest of San...
, where he worked with Patrick Suppes
Patrick Suppes
Patrick Colonel Suppes is an American philosopher who has made significant contributions to philosophy of science, the theory of measurement, the foundations of quantum mechanics, decision theory, psychology, and educational technology...
on experiments in which they tried to use computer
Computer
A computer is a programmable machine designed to sequentially and automatically carry out a sequence of arithmetic or logical operations. The particular sequence of operations can be changed readily, allowing the computer to solve more than one kind of problem...
s to teach math and reading to young children in Palo Alto elementary school
Elementary school
An elementary school or primary school is an institution where children receive the first stage of compulsory education known as elementary or primary education. Elementary school is the preferred term in some countries, particularly those in North America, where the terms grade school and grammar...
s. The Education Program for Gifted Youth
Education Program for Gifted Youth
The Education Program for Gifted Youth, at Stanford University, is a gifted education program which offers distance and residential summer courses for students of all ages. It is a distance learning program, meaning that courses are taught remotely via the Internet, rather than in the traditional...
at Stanford is a descendant of those early experiments.
Eventually, Atkinson transitioned from research to a career in administration, and went on to serve as Director of the National Science Foundation
National Science Foundation
The National Science Foundation is a United States government agency that supports fundamental research and education in all the non-medical fields of science and engineering. Its medical counterpart is the National Institutes of Health...
, Chancellor of the University of California, San Diego
University of California, San Diego
The University of California, San Diego, commonly known as UCSD or UC San Diego, is a public research university located in the La Jolla neighborhood of San Diego, California, United States...
, and President of the University of California system.
Atkinson is widely recognized for his scientific, academic, and administrative accomplishments. He has been elected to the National Academy of Sciences, the Institute of Medicine, the National Academy of Education, and the American Philosophical Society. He is past president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, former chair of the Association of American Universities, the recipient of many honorary degrees. A mountain in Antarctica, and Atkinson Hall, the home of the California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology at UC San Diego, are named in his honor.
Research
After earning his bachelor’s degree at the University of ChicagoUniversity of Chicago
The University of Chicago is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois, USA. It was founded by the American Baptist Education Society with a donation from oil magnate and philanthropist John D. Rockefeller and incorporated in 1890...
and his Ph.D. in experimental psychology and mathematics at Indiana University
Indiana University
Indiana University is a multi-campus public university system in the state of Indiana, United States. Indiana University has a combined student body of more than 100,000 students, including approximately 42,000 students enrolled at the Indiana University Bloomington campus and approximately 37,000...
, Atkinson joined the faculty at Stanford University in 1956. Except for a three-year interval at UCLA, he served as professor of psychology at Stanford from 1956 to 1975. He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
American Academy of Arts and Sciences
The American Academy of Arts and Sciences is an independent policy research center that conducts multidisciplinary studies of complex and emerging problems. The Academy’s elected members are leaders in the academic disciplines, the arts, business, and public affairs.James Bowdoin, John Adams, and...
in 1974. His research on mathematical models of human memory and cognition led to additional appointments in the School of Engineering, the School of Education, the Applied Mathematics and Statistics Laboratories, and the Institute for Mathematical Studies in the Social Sciences. The theory of human memory which Atkinson put forward with his student Richard Shiffrin
Richard Shiffrin
Richard Shiffrin is the Luther Dana Waterman Professor of cognitive science for the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences at Indiana University, Bloomington. Shiffrin has contributed a number of theories of attention and memory to the field of psychology. He co-authored the...
has been influential in shaping research in the field of experimental psychology. Advances in computer-assisted instruction and methods for optimizing the learning process have been among the more applied outcomes of his theoretical interests.
In 1977, he received the American Psychological Association’s Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award.
National Science Foundation
Atkinson was nominated by US President Jimmy Carter to be director of the National Science Foundation (1975–1980). Among his responsibilities was the negotiation of the first memorandum of understanding between the People’s Republic of China and the United States, an agreement for the exchange of scientists and scholars. It became part of a more comprehensive agreement on science and technology between China and the United States signed by Chair Deng Xiaoping and President Jimmy Carter in January 1979.During Atkinson’s tenure at NSF, skeptics in both Congress and the media mounted frequent attacks on government funding for basic research as little more than subsidizing idle curiosity about trivial topics at the taxpayers’ expense. This trend was aptly symbolized by Senator William Proxmire’s Golden Fleece Awards for waste and fraud in public programs, one of which went to NSF for a study of the sexual behavior of screwworm flies. As NSF director, Atkinson defended this and other projects—whose value Senator Proxmire ultimately acknowledged—as well as the long-term importance of fundamental intellectual inquiry. In the same vein, NSF conducted some of the early studies on the contributions of basic research to productivity and economic growth.
U.C. San Diego
Atkinson was chancellor of the University of California at San Diego (UCSD) from 1980–1995, where he instituted a major administrative reorganization of the campus and began a sustained effort to strengthen UCSD's ties with the city of San Diego. This highly successful effort yielded important dividends in the form of financial and community support, with private giving rising from $15 million to nearly $50 million annually during his chancellorship. Despite a series of tight budgets in the late 1980s, he found innovative ways to fund the construction of new buildings and to support new academic programs. UCSD's increasing academic stature was reflected in its 1982 election to membership in the prestigious Association of American Universities, consisting of 62 of the nation's top research universities. The campus's steady growth in size and distinction was a mark of Atkinson's tenure. UCSD's faculty expanded by nearly 50 percent and enrollment doubled to about 18,000 students. In 1995, the quality of its graduate programs was ranked tenth in the nation by the National Research Council.During his years at UCSD, Atkinson also followed a strategy of encouraging technology transfer and active involvement with industry, especially with the small, high-technology companies that were springing up around San Diego in the 1980s and 1990s, (such as Bien Logic
Bien Logic
Bien Logic, Inc. was one of the first interactive marketing agencies based in San Diego, California. In the mid-1990s it was also the largest such company. It pioneered several innovations in web development and internet software industry. Throughout the years 1993 to 1997, over 80 professionals...
). The UCSD CONNECT program, self-sustaining but run by UC San Diego Extension, began in 1985. It was successful in helping aspiring entrepreneurs in high-technology fields find information, funding, and practical support on such crucial topics as writing a business plan, marketing, and attracting capital. It also acted as an advocate on public policy issues that affect business. UCSD's outstanding faculty, innovative research, and commitment to industry-university partnerships were major factors in transforming the San Diego region into a world leader in technology-based industries. Atkinson's role in this transformation was noted in a recent study of research universities and their impact on the genesis of high-technology centers (see Raymond Smilor, Niall O'Donnell, Gregory Stein and Robert S. Welborn, III, "The Research University and the Development of High-Technology Centers in the United States," Economic Development Quarterly, Vol. 21, No.3, August 2007, pp. 203–222).
University of California
Atkinson became the University of California’s seventeenth president in October 1995. His principal goal was sustaining the excellence of UC’s faculty, recognized in several national studies of academic program quality. An equally important challenge was accommodating an additional 63,000 undergraduates—an enrollment increase of forty percent—between 1998 and 2010. UC Merced, the University’s first new campus in forty years, was founded during Atkinson’s presidency.He also sought to expand the University’s contributions to California’s productivity and economic growth through such efforts as the Industry-University Cooperative Research Program, which supports collaborative research in areas critical to the state’s competitive edge. The California Institutes for Science and Innovation, proposed by California Governor Gray Davis and established at four UC campuses, are aimed at creating the next generation of knowledge in high-technology fields through interdisciplinary research partnerships with industry.
Atkinson’s most important task as president, however, flowed from the July 1995 decision by the UC Board of Regents to eliminate racial preferences in admission. Under his guidance, UC embarked on an ambitious partnership with the K-12 public schools to raise the level of academic accomplishment among all California children. Within UC, the Academic Senate and the Regents approved his proposals for several new paths to undergraduate admission that moved UC closer to the comprehensive review of students’ records used by selective private universities. By the end of his tenure, UC was admitting more minority students than it was in 1997, the year before the ban on affirmative action took effect.
Under Atkinson's leadership, the University adopted a new academic freedom policy that clearly defined the central role of the faculty in protecting and promoting the freedom to teach, to do research, and to express and publish views in the context of the modern research university. He established the California Digital Library to expand access to UC's collections and to advance new forms of scholarly communication. UC established several new professional schools and began expanding its graduate enrollments. Enrollment in engineering and computer science—disciplines essential to the high-tech California economy—rose by nearly 70 percent, and total UC enrollment increased by a third, from 150,000 to 202,000 students. The University prospered during Atkinson's tenure. For the first time, private giving reached the billion-dollar mark in a single year, UC's state-funded budget nearly doubled, and federal research funds soared.
Personal life
Atkinson is married to psychologist, Rita, with whom he has one daughter, retired neurosurgeon Lynn. Lynn's husband is pediatric surgeon David Drucker, and their two children are Natalie and Adam Drucker.Legacy
In February 2001, Atkinson announced he was recommending elimination of the College BoardCollege Board
The College Board is a membership association in the United States that was formed in 1900 as the College Entrance Examination Board . It is composed of more than 5,900 schools, colleges, universities and other educational organizations. It sells standardized tests used by academically oriented...
's SAT
SAT
The SAT Reasoning Test is a standardized test for college admissions in the United States. The SAT is owned, published, and developed by the College Board, a nonprofit organization in the United States. It was formerly developed, published, and scored by the Educational Testing Service which still...
I college entrance examination as a requirement for admission to the University of California. Students, he argued, should be tested on what they had actually achieved academically, not on the basis of “ill-defined notions of aptitude.” Atkinson’s challenge inaugurated a national debate on the relative merits of aptitude
Aptitude
An aptitude is an innate component of a competency to do a certain kind of work at a certain level. Aptitudes may be physical or mental...
versus achievement tests and ultimately led to a major revision of the SAT I. The new SAT I, introduced in 2005, incorporates higher-level mathematics and a written essay to reflect the quantitative and writing skills students need for success in college-level work.
As president, Atkinson had to face some of the most contentious and complex issues in American higher education, from achieving diversity to managing a multi-billion dollar budget greater than that of many states. He will be remembered for his skill in guiding the University into the post-affirmative action age and for the creative and energetic leadership he brought to the nation's most distinguished public university.
In 2005, the unnamed Sixth College
Sixth College
Sixth College is the sixth and newest college of the University of California, San Diego, and is as of yet unnamed. Sixth College aims to prepare its students to become effective citizens of the 21st century — innovative, interconnected and aware. Opened in September 2001, Sixth College seeks to...
at UCSD
University of California, San Diego
The University of California, San Diego, commonly known as UCSD or UC San Diego, is a public research university located in the La Jolla neighborhood of San Diego, California, United States...
moved to name the college in his honor. Around April 27, 2005, UCSD students were notified that Dr. Atkinson had withdrawn his name from further consideration as the future namesake of Sixth College. The decision was an abrupt surprise as Atkinson only a week earlier had told The San Diego Union-Tribune
The San Diego Union-Tribune
-Predecessors:The predecessor newspapers of the Union-Tribune were:* San Diego Sun, founded 1861 and merged with the Evening Tribune in 1939.* San Diego Union, founded October 10, 1868.* Evening Tribune, founded December 2, 1895.-Ownership:...
he would be "honored if the name were approved". Although student reception to the naming proposal was lukewarm, demonstrated opposition was generally meager with only conspicuous organized criticism by opponents desiring a more racially diverse name. The Perry scandal was not the subject of public criticism.
Selected papers
- R.C. Atkinson, “Computerized Instruction and the Learning Process,” American Psychologist, Vol. 23, 1968, pp. 225‐239.
- R.C. Atkinson and H.A. Wilson, “Computer‐Assisted Instruction,” in R.C. Atkinson and H.A. Wilson, eds., Computer‐Assisted Instruction: A Book of Readings, Academic Press, New York, 1969.
- R.C. Atkinson, “Instruction in Initial Reading Under Computer Control: The Stanford Project,” Educational Data Processing, Vol. 4, No. 4, 1967, pp. 175‐192.
- Atkinson, R. C., & Shiffrin, R. M. (1968). Human memory: A proposed system and its control processes. In K.W.Spence and J. T. Spence (Eds.), The Psychology of Learning and Motivation: Advances in Research and Theory (Vol. 2, pp. 89-195). New York: Academic Press.
- R.C. Atkinson and R. Shiffrin, "Storage and retrieval processes in long-term memory," Psychological Review, 1969, 76, 179-193.
Further reading
- “Distinguished Scientific Contribution Awards for 1977,” American Psychologist, January 1978, pp. 49–55.
- William J. McGill, “Richard C. Atkinson: President-Elect of AAAS,” Science, Vol. 241, July 29, 1988, pp. 519–520.
- Richard C. Atkinson, “The Golden Fleece, Science Education, and US Science Policy,” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, Vol. 143, No, 3, September 1999, pp. 407–417.
- “Developing High-Technology Communities: San Diego,” report by Innovation Associates, Inc., for the U.S. Small Business Administration, March 2000.
- Patricia A. Pelfrey, A Brief History of the University of California, Second Edition, (Center for Studies in Higher Education and University of California Press, 2004), pp. 78–89.
- David S. Saxon, “Foreword,” The Pursuit of Knowledge: Speeches and Papers of Richard C. Atkinson, ed. Patricia A. Pelfrey (University of California Press, 2007), pp. ix-xi
- Raymond Smilor, Niall O’Donnell, Gregory Stein and Robert S. Welborn, III, “The Research University and the Development of High-Technology Centers in the United States,” Economic Development Quarterly, Vol. 21, No. 3, August 2007, pp. 203–222.
External links
- Richard C. Atkinson biography
- San Diego Reader account of Perry lawsuit
- President Richard C Atkinson's Home Page with more in-depth biographical information.
- Full text of Court of Appeal opinion - California Continuing Education of the Bar
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