Data on the Research Effort

Expenditures for separately budgeted research and development at colleges and universities increased from $410 million to $736 million between 1954 and 1958. According to a survey by the National Science Foundation, the problem of finding the people to perform the increased amount of work represented by the increase in money has largely been met by shifting faculty members already involved in part‐time research over to full‐time participation. The NSF found that in 1958 a total of 69 919 scientists and engineers (defined as all persons with baccalaureate degrees who were doing professional‐level work) were engaged in research at colleges, universities, federal contract research centers, and agricultural experiment stations. Faculty members accounted for 32 820 of the total, which represented an increase of only 3 percent over 1954, but the number of faculty members doing full‐time research increased almost 50 percent, from 7000 to 10 400.