Americas Pressing Challenge Building a Stronger STEM Pipeline

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Americas Pressing Challenge-Building a
Stronger STEM Pipeline
Presented by Dr. Jo Anne Vasquez Director of
Professional Development, Policy and
Outreach Center for Research on Education in
Science, Mathematics, Engineering and
Technology Arizona State University
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Meet the Only Scientist Many Children will ever
Know. A Teacher
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• We are living in exponential times!
• There are 2.7 billion searches on Google each
  month. (Where did we go before then?)
• There are more text messages sent daily than the
  total population of the planet.
• By their 21st birthday, digital kids will have
  sent/received 250,000 emails/IMs, spent 10,000
  hours on the phone, and watched 20,000 hours of
  TV (with 500,000 commercials).

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• There are about 540,000 words in the English
  language, about 5 times more than in
  Shakespeare's time.
• More than 3,000 books are published daily!
• The amount of information in the weekly New York
  Times newspaper is more than the information in a
  lifetime in the 18th Century.
• Yet print newspapers will become
• extinct in our lifetime.

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• Did you know?
• There are 106 million registered on My Space. .
  .if it were a country it would be between Japan
  and Mexico.
• The average my space page is visited 30 times a
  day.

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Kids use electronic media 6.5 hours a day into
which they pack 8.5 hours of exposure to that
media. How?
They multitask.
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• Nintendo spends 140 million on research on
  development.
• Our Federal Government spends less that half of
  that on research and education.
• Its estimated that 1.5 exabytes (thats 1.5 x
  1018) of unique new information will be generated
  worldwide this year.
• Its estimated to be more than 5,000 previous
  years!

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• the amount of new technical information is
  doubling every 2 years.
• That means for a student starting a four-year
  technical or college degree . . .
• Half of what they learn in their first year of
  study will be outdated by their third year of
  study and predicted to double every 72 hours by
  2010.

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What does it all mean?

• Shift is Happening!
• We are now educating the Web 2.0 Generation.

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How do we focus this plugged in generation of
sceenagers?

• Plugged in and bombarded by the fast-paced visual
  world they live in. These kids
• grew up with Nintendo and video games
• look at graphics first, text second
• Are accustomed to, the asynchronous worldwide
  communication of e-mail, broadcast messages,
  bulletin boards, user groups, chat, and Internet
  searches.
• like designing by doing

They are a 160-character nation who operate at
twitch speed!
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. . .math and science are the keys to
innovation and power in todays world, and
American parents had better understand that the
people who are eating their kids lunch in math
are not resting on their laurels. -- Thomas
Friedman, 2005
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Research Education Universities / Colleges
Private Foundations Scientific Societies

• Research
• Private
• Non-profit
• Societies
• Zoos

Law Medicine

• Research Adm.
• Pharmaceutical
• Biotechnology
• Start-ups

Journalism and Media
Policy
K1-12 Education

• Consulting
• Venture Capital
• Wall Street
• Banks

Technology Transfer (Govt, Univ., Law)
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Projected New Job Growth by Technical Field
2002-2012
Computer Mathematical Scientists
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Medical Health Services Managers
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Medical Professionals
Health Technicians
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Life Scientists
10
Physical Scientists
SE Technicians
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SE Managers
Total New Jobs 1,000,000
Total Jobs (due to growth
and net replacement) 3,590,000
Engineers
BLS, Occupational employment projections to 2012
Monthly Labor Review, February 2004
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Science for ALL Americans
JOBS

• Why?
• Help citizens participate intelligently in making
  social and political decision!
• A more compelling argument is. . .
• To enhance competitiveness
• To protect standard of living
• To enter the middle class

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50 Years of Sci-Ed Reform

• October 4, 1957 Sputnik

Cherry picking
April 1983 A Nation At Risk
Science for All Americans
Today NCLB
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We have been Evolutionary!

• Now we need to be Revolutionary!

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The National Science Board
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• The National Science Foundation was established
  by the NSF Act of 1950
• to promote the progress of science to advance
  the national health, prosperity, and welfare and
  secure the national defense.
• The National Science Board provides
• Advice to the President and the Congress on
  matters of national science and engineering
  policy
• Oversight and policy-making for NSF

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Science and Engineering Indicators is required
under the NSF Act. It is designed to provide a
broad base of quantitative information about
U.S. science, engineering, and technology.
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What We Know

• Math and Science Achievement is Critical
• Grand Challenges Exist for K-12 Science and
  Mathematics Education
• A High Quality Science and Mathematics Teaching
  Workforce Is Key
• Teacher Development Must Respond to Need
• New Communication Technologies Offer New
  Challenges and Opportunities for Educators
• Standards for Education What Gets Measured Gets
  Taught

National Science Board Americas Pressing
Challenge January 2006
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63 Billion Spend on Retraining Americas Workforce

• Improving math and science skills of our young
  people is an important step towards maintaining
  innovations-led economic growth in the coming
  decades.

The Committee for Economic Development
(CED) Learning for the Future Changing the
Culture To Ensure a Competitive Workforce
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• Communication Skills
• - Written, Oral, Graphic and Listening
• High Ethical Standards
• Think Both Critically and Creatively -
  Independently and Cooperatively
• Flexibility. Ability Self-Confidence to Adapt
  to Rapid or Major Change
• Curiosity Desire to Learn for Life
• Profound Understanding of the Importance of
  Teamwork
• Ability to Define Problems Develop Solutions
• Ability to Assimilate Relevant Data
• Conceptualize Information Reorganize It

50 of students will not get these skills!
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Math Proficiency and STEM B.S. Degrees Granted

• Math proficiency drops slowly from 4th grade
  through 8th grade
• Falls 3 per year in High School
• Students proficient in math declare STEM majors
• 17 proficient, 15 declare
• 9 loss during college
• (Source Tables 121 and 122, Digest of Education
  Statistics 2005)

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Comparison of Student Populations
Math Proficient
H.S. Graduate
Enrolled College
Declare STEM
Graduate
STEM Degree
8th 12th Freshman B.S.
Source Proficiency data Digest of Education
Statistics 2005, Tables 121 and 122 for 4 and 8th
grades.
Relatively small numbers of students make it
through the system and obtain a STEM B.S. degree
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Key Recommendations

• Gain Public Support
• Develop and Retain a High Quality Mathematics and
  Science Teaching Profession
• Provide Students Opportunities to Learn
• Prepare Guidance Counselors to Provide Quality
  Career Guidance and
• Use Assessments to Reinforce Learning.

National Science Board Americas Pressing
Challenge January 2006
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Collectively these reports press the point. .
. the challenges are so pressing they require a
direct, coordinated, and coherent response from
the community of stakeholders.
What they call for is the transformation of the
systems.
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NSB Commission on 21st Century Educationin
Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics
Congressional Appropriations Language (FY2006)

• endorsed the Board taking steps to
• establish a Commission to make recommendations
  for the National Science Foundation (NSF) and
  Federal Government action to achieve measurable
  improvements in the Nations science education at
  all levels

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NSB Commission on 21st Century Educationin
Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics
The Commission was charged with fashioning

• a bold new action plan to address the Nations
  needs, with recommendations for specific
  mechanisms to implement an effective, realistic,
  affordable, and politically acceptable long-term
  approach to the well-known problems and
  opportunities of U.S. pre-K-16 STEM education
• that effectively employs Federal resources
  cooperatively with those of other stakeholders

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National Action Plan for the STEM Education
System
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Priority Goals
In order to move STEM education forward in the
Nation, the Board believes that two major issues
must be addressed A. Ensuring coherence in the
Nations STEM education systemB.
Ensuring an adequate supply of well-prepared
and highly-effective STEM teachers.
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Priority Recommendation A Coherence

• National Council for STEM Education
• Congress charter a new non-Federal National
  Council for STEM Education that would coordinate
  among all those involved in STEM Education, not
  just at the Federal level.

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National Council for STEM Education
Independent and non-Federal

• Coordinate and facilitate STEM programs and
  initiatives throughout the Nation
• Inform policymakers and the public on the state
  of STEM education in the United States

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Priority Recommendation A

• 2. National Science and Technology Council
• 3 Billion spent on Federal STEM Education
  programs across the agencies.
• Need a full committee to coordinate these
  efforts.
• Members would include Federal agencies STEM
  Education offices and be housed in OSTP

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Priority Recommendation A

• 3. U. S. Department of Education
• Secretary of Education consider appointing an
  expert in STEM Education as a new Assistant
  Secretary of Education.
• Provide a central planning resource to strengthen
  existing and future STEM-related programs within
  the Department.
• Point of contact for states and other agencies
  across the Federal Government in STEM efforts.

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Priority Recommendation A.4

• 4. National Science Foundation
• Provide research on teaching and learning and the
  development of instructions materials.
• Develop the human capital in STEM fields,
  including STEM teachers.
• Improve the public appreciation for and
  understanding of STEM.

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Priority Recommendation A Coherence
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Priority Recommendation A Coherence

• Horizontal Coordination
• Vertical Alignment

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Horizontal Coordination

• All stakeholders work together through the
  National Council for STEM Education by
• Facilitating a strategy to define national STEM
  content guidelines that would outline the
  essential knowledge and skills needed at each
  grade level
• Developing metrics to assess student performance
  that are aligned with national content guidelines
• Ensuring that assessments under No Child Left
  Behind promote STEM learning
• Providing a forum to share and disseminate
  information on best practices in STEM teaching
  and learning

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Vertical Alignment
All stakeholders promote vertical alignment of
STEM education across grade levels by

• Improving the linkage between high school and
  higher education and/or the workforce and
• Creating or strengthening STEM education-focused
  P-16 or P-20 councils in each state.

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Priority Recommendation B STEM Teachers

• Ensure students are taught by well-qualified and
  highly effective STEM teachers by
• Developing strategies for compensating STEM
  teachers at market rates
• Providing resources for the preparation of future
  STEM teachers
• Increasing STEM teacher mobility between
  districts by creating national STEM teacher
  certification standards
• Preparing STEM teachers to teach STEM content
  effectively

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Qualified Teachers

• During the 2004-05 school year, 22 percent of all
  bachelor's degrees awarded in U.S. colleges and
  universities were in business 11 percent were in
  social sciences 7 percent in education and 6
  percent in psychology
• Just 1 percent of undergraduate degrees were in
  math or science.

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Qualified Teachers

• Simply put, most math and science teachers can
  make more money doing something other than
  teaching.
• The median salary for full-time high school
  math and science teachers was 43,000. That
  compares to median salaries ranging between
  50,000 and 72,000 for professionals with
  comparable educational backgrounds such as
  computer systems analysts, engineers, accountants
  or financial specialists, in the same year

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Average STEM Career Professional 70,000 Average
Science and Math Teacher 43,000
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Teacher Supply Model (starting salary)
Probability Student Selects Teaching
30,000 35,000 40,000 45,000 50,000
55,000
2003 data adjusted to 2007 Conditional on
capability and other interest factors
Teacher Starting Salary
Average Teacher Pay
Salary increases the pool of qualified candidates
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Qualified Teachers

• Recognizing that math and science professionals
  have a greater range of high-paying career
  options, colleges and universities tend to pay
  professors in those subject areas more. Medical,
  science and engineering professors can make two
  or three times more than humanities professors.
• Union contracts prevent such differentiation at
  the elementary and high school level.

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Summary

• This action plan lays out a structure that will
  allow stakeholders from local, state, and Federal
  governments, non-governmental STEM education
  stakeholder groups, to
• - work together to coordinate and enhance
• the Nations ability to produce a numerate and
  scientifically and technologically literate
  society
• - and to increase and improve the current STEM
  education workforce.

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Congress is Listening

• (COMPETES) Act (S. 761) America Creating
  Opportunities to Meaningfully Promote Excellence
  in Technology, Education and Science
• Overlap between Action Plan and America COMPETES
• Department of Energy
• Appoint Director of STEM Education to coordinate
  programs (idea of coordination)
• Summer institutes for teacher professional
  development through national labs

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Congress is Listening

• Department of Education
• Support undergraduate programs with concurrent
  STEM degree and teacher certification Teachers
  for a Competitive Tomorrow
• Alignment of P-16 and statewide P-16 data systems
  

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Congress is Listening

• NSF
• Teacher Institutes for the 21st Century
• Robert Noyce Scholarship program expansion of
  program, STEM majors to become teachers
• Teaching Fellowships and Master Teaching
  Fellowships STEM professionals to classroom
  with one year teacher certification or to become
  master teachers

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• One cannot stress enough Young Chinese, Indians,
  and Poles are not racing us to the bottom.
• They are racing us to the top.
• They dont want to work for us they dont even
  want to be like us.
• They want to dominate us in this new
• global knowledge-based economy.

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Bill Gates is recognized everywhere he goes in
China. Young people hang from the rafters and
scalp tickets just to hear him speak.

• In China today, Bill Gates is Britney Spears.

In America today, Britney Spears is Britney
Spears And that is our problem!
Tom Friedman
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Time!
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Its not the machines or the technology that
matter, but the knowledge, intelligence, and
creativity of the people. Dr.
Richard Florida The Flight of the Creative Class
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None of the top 10 jobs that will exist in 2012
exist today and these jobs will employ technology
that hasnt been invented to solve problems we
havent yet imagined
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The Teacher is the Key!
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For More Information
www.nsf.gov/nsb