Amendment would reduce funding for political science research
She also mentioned that faculty sometimes pursue NSF funding independently as well.
Jessica Einhorn, Dean of SAIS, was not immediately available for comment.
However Amir Pasic, Associate Dean for Development & Strategic Planning at SAIS, said that SAIS does not rely on the NSF for funding.
Students for the most part seemed to agree with Bennett and Grovogui.
"That might be the dumbest thing I've ever heard from a politician," Jarrett Olivo, a freshman art history major, said. "Why would you cut a program that educates the people who are going to lead the country?"
Fellow freshman Sophi Glazycheva, a prospective psychology and Writing Seminars major, agreed.
"It seems really strange," she said. "It's like [the senator] is saying whatever I do is not worthwhile."
Junior Aaron Jones, an international studies and economics major, spoke about the nature of political science research.
"It helps humanity learn more about humanity," he said.
He was especially concerned by the prospective of cutting the Hopkins program in Chad.
"If anything, they should run more programs like that. It helps expose students to more worldly views," he said.
When Coburn introduced his amendment to the Senate, he touched on concerns that political science research furthered an understanding of democracy.
"What we've heard already on the blogs is that NSF-funded research contributes to our understanding of democracy. I think we've pretty well figured out what democracy is."
According to the NSF Web site, $163 million dollars out of a total of $4.03 billion dollars of the NSF's federal funding is allocated to research in the social sciences.
Social science funding goes to the Directorate for Social, Behavioral and Economic sciences, a subdivision of the NSF dedicated to those fields of study.
Coburn's proposal, however, called only for the prohibition of NSF funding to political science research.
In his amendment Coburn also proposed that, "Americans who have an interest in electoral politics can turn to CNN, FOX news, MSNBC, the print media and a seemingly endless number of political commentators on the Internet."
He also wrote in a statement to POLITICO that, "Political science would be better left to pundits and voters themselves."
When defending the amendment before the Senate, he emphasized the economics concerns of continuing NSF funding for political research.
"Wouldn't it be smart to not spend money that we don't have on things that we don't need?" he asked.
He claimed that cutting the funding, especially under the current economic climate, was "common sense" and argued that without such common sense, the state of the nation would deteriorate.
"If we forget about making common sense judgment . . . we're history as a country," he said.
Jessica Einhorn, Dean of SAIS, was not immediately available for comment.
However Amir Pasic, Associate Dean for Development & Strategic Planning at SAIS, said that SAIS does not rely on the NSF for funding.
Students for the most part seemed to agree with Bennett and Grovogui.
"That might be the dumbest thing I've ever heard from a politician," Jarrett Olivo, a freshman art history major, said. "Why would you cut a program that educates the people who are going to lead the country?"
Fellow freshman Sophi Glazycheva, a prospective psychology and Writing Seminars major, agreed.
"It seems really strange," she said. "It's like [the senator] is saying whatever I do is not worthwhile."
Junior Aaron Jones, an international studies and economics major, spoke about the nature of political science research.
"It helps humanity learn more about humanity," he said.
He was especially concerned by the prospective of cutting the Hopkins program in Chad.
"If anything, they should run more programs like that. It helps expose students to more worldly views," he said.
When Coburn introduced his amendment to the Senate, he touched on concerns that political science research furthered an understanding of democracy.
"What we've heard already on the blogs is that NSF-funded research contributes to our understanding of democracy. I think we've pretty well figured out what democracy is."
According to the NSF Web site, $163 million dollars out of a total of $4.03 billion dollars of the NSF's federal funding is allocated to research in the social sciences.
Social science funding goes to the Directorate for Social, Behavioral and Economic sciences, a subdivision of the NSF dedicated to those fields of study.
Coburn's proposal, however, called only for the prohibition of NSF funding to political science research.
In his amendment Coburn also proposed that, "Americans who have an interest in electoral politics can turn to CNN, FOX news, MSNBC, the print media and a seemingly endless number of political commentators on the Internet."
He also wrote in a statement to POLITICO that, "Political science would be better left to pundits and voters themselves."
When defending the amendment before the Senate, he emphasized the economics concerns of continuing NSF funding for political research.
"Wouldn't it be smart to not spend money that we don't have on things that we don't need?" he asked.
He claimed that cutting the funding, especially under the current economic climate, was "common sense" and argued that without such common sense, the state of the nation would deteriorate.
"If we forget about making common sense judgment . . . we're history as a country," he said.
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