core, if you will. No one who’s about to push the envelope any-
where.”
To understand fully the role and influence of program officers,
we have to consider the selection of evaluators. Screeners and panel-
ists can be chosen from various pools. Typically, they are academic
experts who are very highly regarded in their field. In three of the
five programs, they are chosen from among former award recipients;
in another, the Society of Fellows, they are chosen from the faculty
of a particular university. In the fifth competition, they are chosen
among experts in the field.
Panelists are identified by the funding agency—that is, by the pro-
gram officer—through consultation with other experts in the field.
The process is similar across four funding organizations (the Society
of Fellows is somewhat different). The description provided in an in-
ternal ACLS document is representative:
All screeners and panelists are accomplished tenured faculty or
independent scholars of comparable attainment. The ACLS board
of directors approves screeners and select panelists. All screeners
and panelists are drawn from a database built up through consul-
tation with the Board, Delegates to the Council, Administrative
Officers of the Learned Societies, and Learned Societies Presi-
dents.^14Because there are some differences in the selection of panelists
versus screeners, we will consider each separately.
The Selection of Panelists
The selection of high-quality panelists is crucial to the prestige of
the fellowship program. As the ACLS’s now-deceased president John
D’Arms explained:
30 / How Panels Work