In Golde and Dore's succinct analysis, “doctoral programs and doctoral students are operating at cross purposes.” (2001, 44) While many factors contribute to this assessment, two are especially germane to the Preparing Future Faculty (PFF) initiative: the question of mismatch and the limited notion of scholarship emphasized in many doctoral programs.

The political science department at the University of Illinois at Chicago had been planning two years ago to revise our graduate program even before we received the Preparing Future Faculty Program (PFF) grant. We were revising our curriculum because of the arrival of new faculty and our switch from a more specialized multi disciplined public policy analysis Ph.D. to a more general political science Ph.D.

I became a member of the PFF steering committee as the graduate student representative at UIC. In that role, I have been actively participating in roundtable discussions dealing with PFF at both the American Political Science Association and the Illinois Political Science Association meetings, which has enabled me to supplement my curriculum vita. For the spring 2001 class, I was responsible for compiling all of the teaching portfolios for the students participating in the program at the University of Illinois-Chicago. Essential components of the PFF training include writing a teaching philosophy statement, building a curriculum vita, creating a teaching portfolio, and encouraging students to attend and participate in political science conferences. I made sure that each portfolio contained certain vital elements: a curriculum vita, sample course materials, past student evaluations, and peer evaluations. I informed the students whenever I discovered that one of these elements was missing. This responsibility reinforced for me the importance of a properly compiled portfolio, especially in the context of a job interview.

When I was asked, “What do you want to be when you grow up,” my varied responses never once included “college professor.” Unable to afford a direct path to graduate school after obtaining a B.A. in politics from Cornell College, I worked for several years, saved money and eventually enrolled in a master's program in public administration. My goal at the time was to obtain a management-level position with a government agency or nonprofit organization. While working on my M.P.A., I attended classes at night and worked full-time as a Continuing Education Program Coordinator at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC). Nearing end of my master's program, I accepted a part-time position as a teaching assistant for the UIC political science department. I viewed that position as simply a means to an end—a way to help finance my last semesters of graduate school. That “means to an end,” however, soon became my life's passion.

The Preparing Future Faculty programs organized within the American Political Science Association are best understood as part of a larger effort to attempt to enhance doctoral professional training. Other initiatives include, but are by no means limited to, “Rostering” in APSA, the “Re-envisioning the Ph.D.” project funded by Pew; the “Responsive Ph.D.” initiative of the Woodrow Wilson Association; the “Carnegie Initiative on the Doctorate;” and complementary “Preparing Future Faculty” programs at Emory, Syracuse and elsewhere. These efforts are based on a number of often implicit propositions which I shall briefly identify.

Howard University has been an active participant in the national PFF program since its inception in 1994. As the only historically black college or university (HBCU) within the national PFF community, it serves as the PFF coordinating institution for the Washington, DC, PFF cluster of institutions. These institutions include Bowie State University, The Catholic University of America, Marymount University, Virginia Polytechnic Institute, and Howard Community College, representing a very diverse and unique PFF community.

The apprentice relationship graduate students share with faculty mentors is founded on dialogue and collaboration. Under this faculty tutelage, graduate students learn to perform teaching, research, and service inform a faculty career. The Socratic portfolio, introduced and described in this essay, provides a tool and a method to facilitate and document the faculty-graduate student apprenticeship. The Socratic portfolio process encourages graduate students and faculty to engage in a conversation about faculty roles and responsibilities, while addressing and developing graduate students' goals and objectives. The resulting inquiry-based portfolio is, at its heart, a response to the Socratic adage, “Know thyself.”

External funding is a common indicator of research productivity in political science. Comparing departments, university administrators often use external funding as an indication of the quality of research. While this can simply reflect administrators' desire for departments to obtain grants that provide overhead for the institution, this metric also rests on an assumption that external funding is a measure of quality research.For example, Indiana University's web site posted a discussion with President Myles Brand on October 23, 2000, in which he stresses “the ability to win competitive grants” as a measure of department and university quality. Also, e.g., while she focuses on an earlier period, see Lewin's (1997) discussion of Stanford, especially its Political Science Department at pp. 213-23. Departments themselves often use external funding as a proxy for research productivity in evaluating faculty performance. Again, the justification is generally that quality research depends on funding and that those who secure competitive funding will publish quality research.

Scores of studies have measured the quality of political science departments. Generally speaking, these studies have taken two forms. Many have relied on scholars' survey responses to construct rankings of the major departments. For example, almost 50 years ago Keniston (1957) interviewed 25 department chairpersons and asked them to assess the quality of various programs, and, much more recently, the National Research Council (NRC 1995) asked 100 political scientists to rate the “scholarly quality of program faculty” in the nation's political science doctoral departments. In response to these opinion-based rankings, a number of researchers have developed what they claim to be more objective measures of department quality based on the research productivity of the faculty (Ballard and Mitchell 1998; Miller, Tien, and Peebler 1996; Robey 1979). While department rankings using these two methods are often similar, there are always noteworthy differences and these have generated an additional literature that explores the relationship between the rating systems (Garand and Graddy 1999; Jackman and Siverson 1996; Katz and Eagles 1996; Miller, Tien, and Peebler 1996).

In the June 2002 issue, a “Concerned Professor” (CP) implored faculty to be more careful in asking sensitive questions of job candidates (“Open Letter to Political Science Faculty about What Not to Ask When Interviewing Job Candidates”). CP is right to be concerned about discriminatory interview questions, and, as CP notes, many interviewers ask questions that run afoul of anti-discrimination laws. Perhaps, CP charitably speculates, it is the increasing pressure on departments to make offers to candidates who are likely to actually take the job that has led to such personal questions about candidates' marital status, dating life and childbearing plans. Nevertheless, CP argues, these questions are inappropriate and must be left completely to the candidate to raise. If that runs the risk of losing a candidate, so be it.

This is the thirty-first year that I have been monitoring participation by women at our annual meeting. These P.S. reports have documented the ascent of women in our profession. While there are signs that women have continued to move ahead in their participation, the picture is again mixed.

Herbert E. Alexander has been designated as Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Political Science at the University of Southern California. He also has been appointed to the Study Commission on Public Financing of Campaigns in Maryland.

Robert F. Cushman Christopher Mitchell and Richard S. Randall New York University

Dale A. Hathaway David Mason, William Watts and Craig Auchter Butler University

Stuart Nagel William J. Crotty Northeastern University

L. Earl Shaw, Jr. William Crotty Northeastern University

Richard N. Swift Farhad Kazemi and Christopher Mitchell New York University

APSA president Theda Skocpol's research has had a profound intellectual influence that crosses disciplinary boundaries and spans several subfields in political science, including comparative politics, comparative-historical analysis, and American politics. Her work addresses major questions about politics and social organization in a remarkably diverse range of empirical settings. What are the causes of major social revolutions, such as the French, Russian, and Chinese revolutions? What is distinctive about the development of the welfare state in United States? How do basic forms of civic life influence American democracy? Running through this diverse body of work is a core concern: Skocpol's passion to show how politics works by studying patterns of conflict and institutional change at the intersection of government and society. This central goal drives the defining features of her work: the comparative-historical approach, attention to institutions and actors whose political role has been neglected, and a dedication to making social science address real world problems. Skocpol's research offers fresh perspectives and provocative arguments that have sparked spirited debates and launched whole new lines of research. In the process, her work has had a profound impact on both the questions that political scientists ask and the methods that they use. She has also served as a powerful voice in favor of universal social support for families in American public policy.

The 98th Annual Meeting, held for the first time in a convention center, drew a near-record attendance to Boston during the sometimes stormy week before Labor Day. Total attendance, including members of the APSA 2002 press, exhibitors, and guests, numbered 6,432, almost surpassing the previous record set in Boston in 1998. APSA will return to Boston again in 2008.

Jean Bethke Elshtain, Fred I. Greenstein, and Charles O. Jones were honored with the 2002 Frank J. Goodnow Award for their significant contributions to the political science profession and the American Political Science Association at the 2002 Honors Reception, Wednesday, August 28, in conjunction with the APSA Annual Meeting in Boston.

The Association honored 21 members for career achievements and outstanding research at the APSA Awards Ceremony in Boston. Hosted by 2002 Program Co-Chairs W. Phillips Shively and Kathryn Sikkink, the ceremony drew nearly 300 attendees. Following the ceremony, 2002 APSA President Robert D. Putnam delivered his Presidential Address, “The Public Role of Political Science,” which will appear in the inaugural issue of Perspectives on Politics this March.

During a lively and interesting meeting on August 28, 2002, the APSA Council approved several significant initiatives focused on civic engagement and the public presence of political science. In addition, Council helped generate substantial changes to the Association's Mentoring and Minority Fellowship Programs by supporting and conditionally approving the reports and proposals of the ad hoc committees.

Theda Skocpol, Victor S. Thomas Professor of Government and Sociology, and director of the Center for American Political Studies at Harvard University, became the Association's 99th President on August 31 at the annual Business Meeting of the Association. Outgoing APSA President Robert Putnam of Harvard University presented Skocpol with the Association gavel. Joining Skocpol in guiding the Association are six new officers and eight council members.

This year's Annual Meeting in Boston saw the Association host nine outstanding students from the 2002 Ralph Bunche Summer Institute. The Institute's director, Paula D. McClain of Duke University nominated the students to present their work at the American Politics I Poster Session. The student-scholars presented and discussed their research on topics ranging from school vouchers to self-placement in Latin American politics. The students were introduced to the meeting by former Bunche student Vesla Weaver, who is now a second-year doctoral candidate at Harvard University. Ms. Weaver presented her work at the 2001 Annual Meeting and drew on her experiences to walk the students through their first meeting. Ms. Weaver did an outstanding job of advising the students throughout their time in Boston. The Bunche students found active discussions with APSA members, and the Annual Meeting as a whole, a beneficial learning experience that they will draw upon in the future.