MAY 1, 2002

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Dear ,«SALUT1»:

I am writing to confirm your participation in this summer's NBER Higher Education Conference: College Decisions, How Students Actually Make Them and How They Could
The papers will be published as a volume tentatively entitled College Decisions: How Students Actually Make Them and How They Could (to be published by the University of Chicago Press). The title that we have agreed upon for you is " . "
The volume has a dual purpose: to analyze current developments in higher education (especially policies with economic foundations) and to set a standard for evidence that will be help to the policy-making community. Following NBER guidelines, papers may analyze the impact of public policies but should avoid making explicit policy recommendations. The reading audience is a combination of the policy-making community in higher education and researchers like yourselves (some of whom are not in academic settings).

The deadline for a first draft of your paper is Thursday, June 20, 2002. We will return the draft to you with comments by Wednesday, July 10, 2002. The conference draft will be due on Friday, August 2, 2002. Your final version, in which we expect you to respond to the comments of conference discussants, will be due on Friday, September 20, 2002. Papers can be mailed to Amy Trethewey, NBER Conference Department, 1050 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02138. Electronic papers should be sent in Word, PDF/Adobe or WordPerfect format to atreth@nber.org. We will make your paper available on the NBER=s Conference Department homepage (www.nber.org/~confer) and later on the page for "Books in Progress." Because we aim to produce the published volume in a timely manner, it is very important to produce the final version in a timely manner after the conference.

You commit yourself to attend the conference, at which you will have thirty-five minutes to present your paper, followed by approximately ten minutes for an assigned discussant's comments and fifteen minutes for comments and questions from the audience. Please plan to use overhead transparencies or an LCD projector presentation that will be visible to all audience members in a large conference room.

The Bureau will cover your expenses in attending the conference in accordance with the usual regulations. You will receive a $7,500 honorarium per paper for preparing and presenting the paper. Co-authors may divide the honorarium between themselves as seems most appropriate. To keep the publication process on time, we will use a system of penalties: $75 per business day for missing any of the deadlines.

To recap the schedule:

Thursday, June 20	Your first draft is due

Wednesday, July 10	Comments sent back to you

Friday, August 2	Your final version due

Tuesday, August 13-15	Conference

Friday, September 20	Final revisions due

We are very pleased that you are going to participate in the College Decisions conference. I look forward to welcoming you to the conference at the Mount Washington Resort & Hotel, August 13, 2002 with a Welcome dinner at 7:00 PM.

Sincerely,

Caroline Hoxby