Ronald A. Howard Endowment

for Decision Education

HELP SUSTAIN DEF FOR YEARS TO COME

Stanford University Professor Ronald A. Howard is a seminal figure in the field of Decision Analysis. A DEF Founder, Ron believes everyone should be empowered with effective Decision Skills that support ethical action.

Join Ron in ensuring DEF's long-term health by participating in our endowment.

Contact us to learn more.

A Message from Ron

As you know, I’ve devoted much of my career to advancing the causes of decision quality, ethical choice, and a voluntary society. I believe it is in all our best interests and those of future generations to continue to advance these causes.

There are many ways to do so. For example, you may choose to role model them in your life, teach foundational principles to others, and/or contribute to organizations that are aligned in purpose and action with advancing them on our behalf.

Many such causes are well-funded by others in a way that our individual contributions, while well-intentioned, have limited impact. However, the cause of decision quality, especially for youth, is an exception. Unless those of us who value it support it, it may not endure.​

Encouraged by DEF’s progress, the Board of Directors has established an endowment fund to ensure DEF is able to persist indefinitely in our mission to empower youth with effective decision skills.  

Our immediate goal is to raise $10 million. In less than a month, this fund has received more than $1 million in contributions. All our board members have contributed. An additional $1 million dollars has been committed so far as a match to double the impact of your contributions.

I hope you will join me in helping us reach this goal. I know of no better way to ensure an ongoing presence of decision education in our schools and, ultimately, in our society.​

We invite you to become a charter contributor and/or a legacy contributor by including this endowment in your will. Contributions are tax-deductible.​

Please share this opportunity with others who may be interested in supporting our work. Use the forms below to formalize your contribution.

wHY WE NEED AN ENDOWMENT - What We've Learned

During DEF's first 20 years, we learned many things, including:
Decision Skills are a superpower of value to students and valued by educators. Decision Skills are non-intuitive but they are teachable and accessible to young people.
DEF's integrated curriculum is unique, scalable, and effective.

​​Importantly, we've also identified significant challenges:
People are not aware of the huge personal benefits of Decision Quality.
Most decision-making education is simplistic and doesn’t address uncertainty.
Long-term, persistent effort will be needed to transform traditional education.

Your contribution to DEF’s endowment will:
Sustain and extend our capacity to pursue our mission,
Provide the means to maintain our focus on deep Decision Skills, including uncertainty.

rON'S RETIREMENT ADDRESS

At his retirement party, Ron emphasized the importance of Decision Education by sharing a lecture on conditional probability. DEF responded by producing a video, following through on Ron's vision in a way high school students can understand and demonstrating our commitment to teach deep Decision Skills, including uncertainty.