Note to users. If you're seeing this message, it means that your browser cannot find this page's style/presentation instructions -- or possibly that you are using a browser that does not support current Web standards. Find out more about why this message is appearing, and what you can do to make your experience of our site the best it can be.

Science 21 July 2000:
Vol. 289. no. 5478, p. 373
DOI: 10.1126/science.289.5478.373c
Prev | Table of Contents | Next

ScienceScope

Thirteen senators have so far thrown their weight behind an effort to double the National Science Foundation's (NSF's) budget to $8 billion by 2006. In a 12 July letter to Senate leaders Trent Lott (R-LA) and Tom Daschle (D-SD), the lawmakers touted investments in R&D and education as "the building blocks of the new economy" and noted that Congress has already put the budget of the National Institutes of Health on a doubling path. "It is now time to launch a parallel effort" for NSF, concluded Senators Kit Bond (R-MO) and Barbara Mikulski (D-MD), the letter's lead authors and senior members of the appropriations subcommittee that funds NSF.

Science lobbyists say the letter should revive a bid to double the NSF budget, currently bogged down in politics (Science, 7 July, p. 31). "It signals that the idea is being taken seriously," adds a Senate appropriations aide. But he notes that House lawmakers have already severely trimmed the Administration's $675 million requested increase for 2001, a major step toward doubling. The question now, he says, is whether the Senate "can muster the votes to turn things around."

To Advertise     Find Products

Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)