BY KATHARINE SHILCUTT

For as long as there has been a President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) — which, in its current incarnation, has existed since it was chartered by President George H.W. Bush in 1990 — the papers, memoranda and other crucial documents that trace these scientists and their work at the White House has been almost entirely inaccessible by researchers, let alone the general public.

Now, however, the White House Scientists Archive has been established at Rice thanks to years of tireless work by Baker Institute for Public Policy scholar Kenneth Evans; Kirstin Matthews, the director of the Baker Institute’s Science and Technology Policy Program and the Center for Health and Biosciences’ Biomedical Research Program; and Neal Lane, former science adviser to the president during the Clinton administration and longtime Rice faculty member.

A fully digital repository of those important documents, the archive also contains hours of oral histories with PCAST members from 1990 to the present day, contextualizing the documents as well as providing an important jumping-off point for researchers looking to explore the thousands of records that have been hand-collected via presidential libraries and Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests.

“One of the things that made me immediately excited about the project when I heard about it is that I would have loved to have had something like this when I took the job as science adviser,” said Lane, the senior fellow in science and technology policy at the Baker Institute and professor emeritus of physics and astronomy, who was director of the National Science Foundation from 1993 to 1998. Lane served as Clinton’s science adviser and director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) from 1998 to 2001, and quickly discovered that finding information about his predecessors’ activities could only be done on a piecemeal basis.

“Maybe somebody wrote a book or had an article in a magazine, and of course staff would help put things together — but I would have liked to have had access to real research that was done on original data and manuscripts and documents, and Dr. Evans has run all over the world tracking down documents that are as original as you can get your hands on,” Lane said. “I got really excited because there was nothing in existence where you could easily find what you might need in order to get a synthesis of how science policy has changed over time or to encourage scholars to do research on it.”

Presidents do a lot of things, as Lane put it. Yes, they make decisions about science and technology policy, but when it comes to collections of materials, you’re much more likely to find archives on national security or economic affairs. That’s where Evans came in.

Evans has spent the last five years trekking to presidential libraries and federal archives, filed countless FOIA requests and written numerous grants to support the work of gathering every bit of information he could find about the PCAST and its activities over the last 35 years.

“PCAST works at the nexus between science and policy, helping presidents understand why science matters and how science can inform decisions in the White House,” said Evans, a Baker Institute scholar in science and technology policy who now serves as the program manager and co-founder of the White House Scientist and Science Policy Dynamic Digital Archive (shortened to the White House Scientists Archive) alongside Matthews. “PCAST is unique among federal advisory committees because of its direct access to the president, the preeminence of its membership, and its broad mission to advise on all aspects of science and technology policy. PCAST offers an interesting case study for understanding the changing authority and policy impact of scientific expertise.”

The result of all those years of document-gathering is an archive that aims to provide researchers with access to primary source materials, enhancing the study of presidential science advisers and synthesizing historical data to understand the evolution and impact of science policy over time. And although the archive itself is brand-new, Matthews said they’re already learning from the information as they accrue it, such as the discovery that early PCAST documents were clearly not written for public audiences.

“They were much more academic in their writing and language,” said Matthews. “But over time scientists have learned so much more about communicating what they’re doing for the public — it’s more engaging for a broader audience.”

I would have loved to have had something like [the White House Scientists Archive] when I took the job as science adviser.

— Neal Lane

Shortly after Matthews arrived at the Baker Institute as a fellow in 2003, she helped organize an event that would prove pivotal for the eventual creation of the White House Scientists Archive: a 65th birthday celebration for Lane, which was attended by many notable figures in science and policy, including nearly every science adviser for the U.S. president, past and present. Allan Bromley, Jack Gibbons, Rosina Bierbaum, Jack Marburger, John Holdren and others whose names would eventually make up the bulk of the White House Scientists Archive spoke at the event, which produced a book seeking to bridge the gap between science and society.

“I always wanted to do more and lean into Dr. Lane’s experience within OSTP, but there were just the two of us back then,” Matthews said. “When Dr. Evans came into the program in 2016, that was one of the first things we started focusing on — understanding and really looking at how PCAST works — and the project just kept growing and growing as time progressed. But I don’t know if we would have really focused on the White House if Dr. Lane wasn’t here.”

Lane was instrumental in encouraging fellow White House scientists to contribute their personal papers and oral histories, which illuminate the reams of documents contained in the digital archive housed at Rice’s Woodson Research Center in Fondren Library.

“That’s the power of Neal Lane,” said Amanda Focke, head of special collections at the Woodson Research Center, who collaborates with Evans and a slew of Rice students to process the oral histories and other documents in order to create the digital collection. It’s an archive that will not only provide important scholarly opportunities for students and researchers alike for years to come, she said; it’s one that could only have happened at a place like Rice.

“Rice has been known from day one for science and engineering, plus there’s a deep tradition of policy study here, and Fondren Library has the infrastructure to house that and make it accessible for the long term, so I think there are a lot of reasons why pulling it together here makes sense,” Focke said.

In the long term, the archive plans to incorporate additional oral histories, AI-assisted data management and a database for scholarly study that’s being created by Rice students as part of a Fondren Fellows program. And one of the most exciting things moving forward, Matthews said, is the fact that the archives will constantly be replenished with each new presidential administration.

“Once the PCAST turns over within an administration, that’s when we’ll try to capture things, maybe with an oral history of a couple people, pulling more detailed information from their experiences, collecting those into the archives,” said Matthews. “There will always be more to keep adding to the collection.”

Over time scientists have learned so much more about communicating what they’re doing for the public — it’s more engaging for a broader audience.

— Kirstin Matthews

As part of the Baker Institute’s spring programming for 2025, Evans and Matthews are planning an event, titled “Science and the American Presidency,” at the Baker Institute that will feature a panel of U.S. presidential science advisers, including Lane, Alondra Nelson and Kelvin Droegemeier. It will be moderated by former Rice librarian Charles Henry. The event will also spotlight materials from the White House Scientists Archive through an exhibit hosted in Doré Commons in Baker Hall that will run throughout the spring.

“We are continuing to collect people’s papers, people’s documents — stuff that’s sitting in their garage or attics,” Evans said. “We want to raise awareness of the archive and what we hope will become a national hub for people to send all archival materials related to U.S. science and technology policy. So in addition to me traveling around the world, we hope people will donate to Woodson as part of their permanent collections next to Neal’s papers and many others.”

Lane believes the archive, which would have once been of such use to him as a brand-new presidential adviser himself, will also serve an important purpose beyond research on science policy as it grows over time.

“Hopefully it will be helpful to the State Department and ambassadors and envoys and others within the presidential administrations,” he said. “That would be a nice service to provide.”