After nearly four decades at the forefront of the movement to improve higher education nationally, the American Association for Higher Education in Washington, D.C., has announced that it will cease operations later this year and that most of its staff will have moved on by May 31.

In a statement to AAHE members, board chair Bernadine Chuck Fong, president of Foothill College in Los Altos Hills, California, said that "despite vigorous efforts," president Clara M. Lovett and the board had concluded that the organization "no longer has the resources to continue its historic leadership role in higher education."

According to Lovett, plans are under way to continue the association's work in assessment, the history of teaching and learning, electronic portfolios research, and other initiatives under the leadership of other organizations and academic institutions. She added that discussions are under way with the Indianapolis-based Lumina Foundation to identify a new home for the Building Engagement and Attainment of Minority Students (BEAMS) Project, and with Heldref Publications, publisher of Change magazine, for which AAHE has provided editorial leadership since 1985.

Commenting on the news, Lee Shulman, president of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, noted that the association had had a special relationship with his organization in its support for "a broader conception of scholarship, its commitment to the scholarship of teaching and learning, and its role as a forum for the most exciting new ideas in our field." Added Shulman, "We at the foundation and in the rest of the higher education community must work even harder to make up for the sad loss of this significant organization."