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Grosvenor Scholars Program:
At National Geographic, Texas State students help
to formulate national education policy

Audrey Mohan Grosvenor Scholar 2007-2008

Audrey Mohan had been teaching high-school geography for three years in Burnet, TX, when she decided to get a PhD in geography, because she had grown to love the subject.

One reason she chose Texas State’s PhD program was that it offered the chance to become a Grosvenor Scholar and to work for a year at the National Geographic Society (NGS) in Washington, D.C. Funded by the Mitte Foundation and the NGS Education Foundation, and administered through Texas State’s Gilbert M. Grosvenor Center for Geographic Education, the Grosvenor Scholars program is the only program of its kind in the nation. It is open only to PhD students in Geographic Education at Texas State.

“The program offers a unique opportunity for Texas State students to work in a critical policy-making environment at National Geographic and in Washington, D.C.,” said Dr. Richard Boehm, Director of the Grosvenor Center. “Students work with Congressional leaders and with the NGS leadership, including Gil Grosvenor, the chair of the board of trustees of the National Geographic Society. They get the kind of experience that would be impossible to get if they were to stay on our campus.

The Grosvenor Scholars program is the only program of its kind in the nation. It is open only to PhD students in Geographic Education at Texas State.

“The Grosvenor Scholars are on a par with other well-known programs across the country, including programs such as the Fulbright Scholars and Humphrey Scholars programs,” Boehm added.

Now in her fifth month as a Grosvenor Scholar, Mohan is working at National Geographic on projects aimed at helping America’s teachers to obtain the training and materials they need to teach geography. For example, she is developing a survey that will tell NGS whether teachers are benefiting from the professional development funding that NGS provides to schools. She also meets with leaders of public and private agencies, executive directors of national corporations, college faculty, state social studies coordinators, scientists, and Congressional leaders in an effort to gain support for federal legislation titled “Teaching Geography is Fundamental.” If passed, the legislation will fund geographic education in public schools.

“Geographic education is the only core subject taught in K-12 that receives no designated federal funding, yet it can be argued that knowledge of geography is crucial to our competitiveness as a nation,” Mohan said.

“Often, the people I talk with don’t know what geographic education is. They think it’s labeling maps and knowing where places are. I tell them that geography is the study of relationships between the physical environment and the human environment. Geography addresses issues such as global warming, environmental hazards, cultural conflict, overpopulation, and globalization—issues that Americans need to understand.”

Zach Moore Grosvenor Scholar 2006-2007

Zach Moore, the 2006-2007 Grosvenor Scholar, also worked on the “Teaching Geography is Fundamental” legislation, meeting frequently with Congressional leaders such as Sen. Edward Kennedy and Sen. Barack Obama, both members of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. Through Moore’s efforts and those of others at NGS, the legislation was included in the bill reauthorizing the No Child Left Behind Act, which Congress will begin to consider in January 2008. The “Teaching Geography is Fundamental” portion of the legislation calls for appropriating $15 million a year for five years for teacher training in geography.

“It was a major step getting the geographic education language into the bill reauthorizing No Child Left Behind,” Moore said. “It was also the most valuable experience of my period as a Grosvenor Scholar,” he said, explaining that his work on national policy with Congressional leaders helped him to build important skills that he will carry into his career. He hopes to teach and research at a university and to consult in industry.

At National Geographic, Moore also worked with students and professionals from some of the nation’s top universities, including Harvard and Stanford. “Because of the training I’ve received at Texas State, I was able to compete well with my colleagues. I was also proud to be able to represent Texas State among such distinguished universities,” he said.

Mohan, who also hopes to teach at a university, has been researching federal grant programs in support of NGS’s effort to gain federal funding for geographic education.

“I’ve learned how a grant goes from being a piece of legislation to its administration at the local school level, and I’ve become very interested in educational policy as a result,” Mohan said. “I’m learning things about educational policy that I wouldn’t have learned without being in Washington, D.C.—information I can use throughout my career.”

Moore said he would like to thank Dr. Boehm, Grosvenor Center Director, for initiating the Grosvenor Scholars Program and for the opportunity it provides every year for a graduate student to work at National Geographic—an experience that students can’t get on a college campus. Both Moore and Mohan said the scholars position has given them valuable experience not only in working with government but in research and administration, and that their work for NGS has contributed to the quality of their dissertations. Moore’s dissertation investigates societal influences—such as curricular change, war, depression—on the teaching of geography in K-12. Mohan’s dissertation measures the effect of teacher training on the teaching of geography in K-12.

Mohan says that she was reluctant initially to participate in the Grosvenor Scholars program because it meant having to move cross-country to Washington, D.C., and to put her dissertation on hold for a year. She said she appreciates the encouragement to apply that she received from Dr. Boehm. “I was afraid that the Grosvenor Scholar position might be more trouble than it was worth,” she said. “I didn’t understand then how important the professional experience is: it has changed my life.”