Inclusive Scholarship: Developing Black Studies - Ford Foundation

Preface
The Ford Foundation is primarily known for its grant-making in the
United States and in 12 overseas locations. Over the last decade, Ford has
awarded more than $3 billon to support innovative institutions and individuals
committed to strengthening democratic values, reducing poverty,
promoting international cooperation, and advancing human achievement.
Worldwide, the foundation makes more than 2,000 grants a year.
With such a large and highly diverse portfolio of international grantmaking,
we believe it is crucial to assess the impact of our work over sustained
periodsof time.Thus,besidesmakinggrants,partof thefoundation’scoremission
is to continually share lessons learned from these efforts. We assess projectsandmorecomprehensiveinitiativesinavarietyof
ways,typicallyincluding
using standard evidence-based methodologies and evaluation techniques
drawn from the social sciences.From time to time,however,we also ask distinguished
scholars, policy experts, seasoned practitioners, and communitybased
activists to review a body of work and provide qualitative commentaries
on what they think has been accomplished and what challenges remain.
In the past 25 years, no arena of higher education grant-making has
received more sustained attention from the foundation than scholarship
and curriculum development in African American Studies. Our grantmaking
in African American Studies is carried out within the program area
entitled “Knowledge, Creativity, and Freedom” and within the field of education
and scholarship. In 1982, Dr. Sheila Biddle, a program officer at the
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