WOODWORKS
The legacy of a lifetime of research

It began with a typewriter.

In a 1929-31 study Ben D. Wood, a Teachers College alumnus and pioneer in the field of learning technologies and testing, showed that using typewriters encouraged more and higher quality writing and better cooperation in the classroom.

Years later the connection led to IBM where the study formed the basis of IBM's Writing to Read program, developed by one of Wood's associates. Wood, Professor of Collegiate Educational Research at Columbia University, was also a key figure in the proliferation of standardized tests and consulted on the development of the first commercial test scoring machine, the IBM 805.

Wood's lifework was research; he wanted others to be able to do the same. Thanks to savvy, early investment in IBM, Wood established endowment funds at TC. In 1972 he set up the Elbenwood Fund for Educational Research, followed by the Institute for Learning Technologies Fund in 1986. In 1989, three years after her husband's death at 91, Grace Turner Wood established the Ben and Grace Wood Fellowship Fund, through which 26 doctoral students have received three years of full tuition and a stipend.

Wood was awarded the Teachers College Medal for Distinguished Service in 1969. Columbia University Professor Emeritus George C. Thompson, who became friends with his colleague after retirement, says that Wood, a native Texan, had a mind that was rarely at rest: "He was a self-made man, and a very kind person."

Substantial gifts such as the endowed funds– made possible by the generosity and foresight of Ben Wood–make an enormous impact at the College. His scholarships have enhanced TC's ability to attract the best students and to keep them–and have given dozens of students the gift of graduating debt-free.