There will be two phases of work conducted by ICPSR to achieve the Foundation?s goals of (1) establishing and maintaining open access to the GMS and WSA databases, (2) establish and maintain appropriate user guidelines, and (3) addressing a priority set of unanswered research questions for grantees.

The first phase of this pilot project is an extensive assessment of the scope, structure, and content of the GMS/WS Longitudinal Studies and their designed, data structures, and processing needs. These studies were planned and conducted by the Gate s Foundation Research Advisory group and National Opinion Research Center. A total of six tasks are designated in phase 1 (see work plan in section 3).

The assessment is directed toward a plan of action (Phase 2) to include a) data processing of all Gates Millennium and Washington Scholars cohort studies; b) data dissemination/release, c) creation of user guide materials, d) a training workshop to introduce and familiarize researchers with the data, and e) promotion of the study for analytical use by the broader research and policy communities.