
Class of 2015 – MacArthur Foundation - japhyr
https://www.macfound.org/fellows/class/2015/
======
roymurdock
I'm surprised at how many Ivy League/top-tier college recipients there are on
the list. On the one hand, it makes sense as these people are at the forefront
of their fields and therefore should be at the best institutions. On the
other, I would expect that they would get enough funding from their
universities and that the grant might serve a maverick/independent candidate
better. Do half of the grants usually go to top-tier institutional researchers
and artists?

~~~
jacobolus
Top researchers look for institutions where their work will get the best
support and exposure, and top institutions look to bring together the best
researchers. As a result, much of the most exciting new research is
concentrated at the top, and just as importantly in this context, the work at
those institutions has generally better marketing/reach, so is more likely to
be familiar to folks in charge of picking MacArthur fellows.

To answer your question: yes, a substantial proportion of MacArthur fellows
every year are affiliated with places like (from this year) Harvard, Stanford,
MIT, Berkeley, Princeton, UChicago, Cornell, Columbia, etc.

~~~
Hazzzzz1
Found the Chicago grad...

~~~
auntienomen
Actually, it looks like he's a Harvard guy.

------
mturmon
Past years are available at wiki:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MacArthur_Fellows_Program](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MacArthur_Fellows_Program)

In particular, go down to the bottom for the outbound links to the
macfound.org summary lists for each year.

Definitely interesting to browse: Stephen Wolfram (1981). Jared Diamond
(1985). David Donoho (1991). DFW (1997). Tim B-L (1998). David Simon (2010).
One forgets.

------
pervycreeper
Didn't notice anything too amazing or groundbreaking amongst the recipients'
work. Looks like these awards have been coopted by those who put politics
above all else.

~~~
kenko
You know a lot about modern dance choreography and tap?

~~~
mturmon
OTOH, their earlier foray into puppeteers (Bruce Schwartz, 1988) did not go as
well as might be hoped. He now operates a yoga studio in Pasadena
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Schwartz](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Schwartz)).
Hopefully Basil Twist (2015) will redeem the profession.

