Hands-on teaching of science is stressed in the PEI, which includes teacher training, curriculum development and construction of Pfizer Science Labs. The Council for Aid to Education was founded in 1952 and became an independent subsidiary of RAND in 1996. Pfizer is located in New York City. According to the paper, about 1,200 students apply for the LEAD program. Ten business schools and 27 corporations participate in the program.
Corporate sponsors pay for student fees, notes the paper.
Michael Peel, vice president of personnel for General Mills, said the company has selfish reasons for participating in the program the past five years. Anything we can do to enrich the talent pool will enrich us in the intermediate to long term. According to the paper, LEAD has had about 4,000 participants, about 2,500 of whom currently work in the private sector. Raphael Bostic, a 1982 LEAD alumnus, who now works for the Federal Reserve Board, praises the program for giving him exposure to the private sector. He acknowledged that the program will not end the old-boy network prevalent in the business world, but it can lessen its significance.