ANN ARBOR—The University of Michigan School of Education recently received a first-time $175,000 educational grant from the Goldman Sachs Foundation. The Foundation aims to develop and support tomorrow’s global leaders by creating innovative programs promoting educational excellence worldwide.

U-M education Profs. Michael T. Nettles—a prominent national policy researcher on educational assessment, student performance and achievement, educational equity, and higher education finance policy—and Catherine M. Millett—an assistant research scientist who is a co-principal investigator of a national research project on doctorial students, a national study of college student retention, and a study of college admission test-takers—will use the award to evaluate research involving GSF’s signature initiatives.

The program involves developing the academic abilities and entrepreneurial talents of high potential youth who are underrepresented in the nation’s most selective colleges and universities. It involves evaluating four of the nation’s not-for-profit organizations that identify and attract the most talented underrepresented youth. Beginning at seventh-grade, the program prepares the youth to compete for admission and subsequent academic success in the most selective academic programs in high school as well as colleges and universities.

The four Foundation-funded organizations and projects are: Bank Street College of Education‘s project to expand the academic development of youth in New York City’s Catholic schools and professional development for their teachers; A Better Chance‘s project to advance the leadership of students in independent schools; Johns Hopkins University Center for Talented Youth project to attract students from a distance to its academic enrichment program; and Prep for Prep‘s project to advance the leadership development of youth in New York area public schools, called the New York Metro Leadership Academy.

While the emphases of the four projects overlap, each one has a distinctive mission and history, unique goals, and a unique philosophy and approach. The evaluation is designed to assess the accomplishments of the overall initiative and the four programs in achieving its goals.

The Foundation was launched in 1999 with a first-of-its-kind contribution of $200 million from the Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (NYSE:GS) concurrent with the Group’s initial public offering. To date, the Foundation has made nearly $33 million in grants.

Other grant-receiving organizations for this year include: the Posse Foundation, New York; the Washington Center for Internships and Academic Seminars, Washington, D.C.; International Baccalaureate Organization, Geneva, Switzerland; the Success for All Foundation, Baltimore, Md.; New Teacher Center at the University of California at Santa Cruz; High Schools That Work, Atlanta, Ga.; New American Schools, Arlington, Va.; Columbia University and the University of California at Berkeley; University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education and the Wharton School of Business; Yale University School of Management; and the Urban Institute, Washington, D.C.