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IN THE HISTORY OF AMERICAN PUBLIC EDUCATION THE LARGEST GIFT He notes that some of the most sig- nificant changes involved making the standards "less U.S.-centric." This required changing some of the measurement concepts that are spe- cific to U.S. schools, as well as some of the language. "Words like 'diver- sity,' 'full-time equivalents,' 'tenure' and 'tenure track' will have to be modified for the global school setting," Policano says. "We also moved away from describing what specific courses should be in the curriculum to focusing on learning outcomes." While the change in standards will allow schools more flexibility in meeting certain requirements, some members have expressed concern that the new standards might lack some quantitative preciseness, says Sorensen. "For instance, one of the earlier formulas took the number of student credit hours divided by 400 to determine a minimum full-time equivalent faculty," says Sorensen. "But some things our accreditation standards measured weren't available in other cultures. These schools didn't use credit hours as the basis for determining faculty." The committee plans to have a draft of the standards ready for the membership vote at next year's An- nual Meeting in New Orleans. "By that time, the standards will have been reviewed by many different groups, the unit will have been pretty well established, and the maintenance of the accreditation process will have been through much experimental use. By the next Annual Meeting, we hope to be ready," says Policano. "There's a lot of thoughtful dis- University of Arkansas Receives $300 Million from Walton The University of Arkansas in Fayetteville recently received the largest gift in the history of American public higher education—a $300 million commitment from the Walton Fam- ily Charitable Support Foundation of Bentonville, Arkansas, to establish and endow an undergraduate honors college and endow the graduate school. "This unprecedented generosity from the Walton family will trans- form the University of Arkansas for our students and faculty, and in the process position us to serve as a powerful engine of economic devel- opment and cultural change for the entire state," said University of Arkansas Chancellor John A. White. "What the Walton family has done today will improve life in Arkansas for generations to come, and we are grateful beyond words. "Our goal is to build a 'Top 50' students. This is essential because Arkansas ranks next to last among the 50 states and the District of Co- lumbia in the percentage of the adult population with bachelor's and ad- vanced degrees. Second, through the recruitment of new faculty and new graduate students, we will be able to build significantly stronger research programs in critical areas." The gift is the largest ever made to a U.S. public university, and the fifth largest made to a public or pri- vate university, according to The Chronicle of Higher Education. The Walton Family Charitable Support Foundation was founded to support specific charities in the state of Arkansas. It was established by the family of the late Sam M. Walton, who created Wal-Mart Stores Inc., now the world's largest corporation. In October 1998, the Walton cussion going on, but in most cases, members have made strong com- ments of support," says Sorensen. public research university to help lift our state, and this gift will do two extremely important things to propel us in that direction," White added. "First, it will allow the university to recruit greater numbers of highly tal- ented undergraduate and graduate Family Charitable Support Founda- tion made a $50 million gift to what was later renamed the Sam M. Wal- ton College of Business at the Uni- versity of Arkansas. At the time, the gift was the largest ever made to an American business school. Rob Walton, chairman of the board of Wal-Mart Stores Inc., and co-chair of the university's Cam- paign for the Twenty-First Century, said, "The investment we are mak- BizEd JULY/AUGUST 2002 9