We have been declining for years and since Bush got into office there has been no improvement.

Laggards in science ed
Monday, December 10, 2007
Editorial
The Times of Trenton

http://www.nj.com/opinion/times/editorials....xml&coll=5

The country that was the first to land a man on the moon continues to lose ground here on Earth when it comes to knowledge of science.

A recent test of 15-year-old students from around the world showed that U.S. students ranked 29th out of 57 countries when it comes to science literacy. Worse yet, the U.S. ranked below the international average score, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. The international study, conducted every three years by the Programme for International Student Assessment, tested 400,000 15-year-olds on literacy in science, math and reading last year. This most recent study placed a special emphasis on science because, as the report stated, solving scientific problems in today's society is "more important than ever."

The students from Finland scored the highest in the study, followed by students from Hong Kong/China, Canada and Estonia. The poor performance by the United States should not be taken simply as more bad news. Instead, it should be used as a rallying point for educators and politicians to begin to develop and implement strategies to improve science and math education.

For many years, reports have been issued showing the U.S. lagging behind other coun tries when it comes to education in science. This time, tying with 19 other countries in the study, the United States scored higher in science literacy than only nine of the other countries. Almost one out of every four students who took the test ranked at the lowest levels of scientific literacy.

The results of the math literacy test were even worse. There is some debate over the accu racy of the results, given that differences in population makeup of the countries can skew the statistics. For example, it is difficult to compare a nation with a population of 300 million that includes many im migrants who may have language problems to a nearly homogenous population of fewer than six million people. Still, the scores do not bode well for the state of science education in this country.

In reaction to the report, Rep. Rush Holt, D-Hopewell Township, a scientist by training, says it's time to bolster science education in our schools.

Perhaps a starting point would be to shift more federal funding toward science education in schools that would improve school laboratories, ob tain scientific equipment and update curricula to reflect the changes that seem to happen almost daily in science. Schools also have to be far more aggressive in hiring truly qualified science teachers, even if it means sweetening the salary pot.

Government leaders and educators should be vocal proponents of the importance of scientific knowledge, especially in the competitive world market today and especially in light of the findings of a recent report that showed that only a minority of high school students want to go into a science-based career.

If the current trends are not reversed, American students may have difficulty competing in science with international students, the result of which will mean fewer jobs for Americans in science-related fields in the coming years and a long- term negative impact on the American economy.

from the December 05, 2007 edition -
http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/1205/p02s01-usgn.html
New report ranks U.S. teens 29th in science worldwide

Why this information could be a useful tool in improving science education.
By Amanda Paulson | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

Chicago
The United States lags behind most other developed countries when it comes to science education.

That, at least, is one conclusion of a major report released Tuesday by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). It measures student literacy in science, math, and reading (focusing this year on science) among 15-year-olds, and is an often-cited reference for policymakers sounding the alarm bells about the state of education in the United States and its implications for the ability of Americans to secure jobs in a global economy.

Finland emerged at the top of 57 countries in science, according to the 2006 survey results from the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). The US ranked 29th, behind countries like Croatia, the Czech Republic, and Liechtenstein, and ahead of just nine other OECD countries.

"What once was the gold standard [for international education] is now not even at the OECD average, which shows you how much the world has changed," says Andreas Schleicher, who helped write the report. The US is average in the number of students at the highest levels of scientific literacy, but has a much larger pool – nearly 1 in 4 – at the bottom, Mr. Schleicher notes. "We have stand-alone studies that suggest these kids have grim prospects in the labor market," he says.

That worry has energized education advocates and reformers, who see the test as a useful tool to catalyze public opinion behind the need for fundamental change in how America educates.

"To most policymakers there's almost a believed connection between how well our kids do in school and how well our economy does in the global economy," says Marc Tucker, president of the National Center on Education and the Economy. "To the extent that you have first-class bulletproof studies saying this over and over, it provides some powerful ammunition... to make the kind of investments in our schools that we really have to make."

Not everyone sees PISA as bulletproof. Comparing something as different as educational systems in countries with different cultures and populations is fraught with complexities; some experts say the rankings are not as straightforward as they might seem.

"People love to cite bad stories," says Clifford Adelman, an associate with the Institute for Higher Education Policy, noting that after each PISA release, experts tend to bemoan America's poor showing. The truth, he says, is more complicated. The US, for instance, typically has a large proportion of students taking the test in a language other than their native one. Some countries track lower performing students into vocational schools where they will not be tested. Other countries are just smaller and more homogenous.

"The question is how you account for that statistically," says Mr. Adelman. In these tests, "I'm comparing [the US] a country of 300-odd million people, a nation of immigrants, that is incredibly diverse with, in the example of Finland, a country of [just under] 6 million people."

Others dismiss such concerns as excuses. "At the end of the day, that young person is going to have to go compete head to head for a job with someone in another country," says Bob Wise, president of the Alliance for Excellent Education and former governor of West Virginia. Rather than focus on America's relatively low standing, he and others would like to see policymakers learn from other countries that have managed to improve their PISA scores, despite large immigrant populations and socioeconomic challenges.

"The lesson from PISA is that it's not enough to test; you have to have the support and strategy to take advantage of what you learn from those tests," says Mr. Wise. "Every community is not wired to the world, and every child needs to have an education that looks good not compared to the county next door, but internationally."

Science performance scores: selected countries

Finland: 563

Hong Kong-China: 542

Canada: 534

Estonia: 532

Croatia: 493

United States: 489

Russia: 479

Turkey: 424

Mexico: 410

Brazil: 390

Krgystan: 322

Average score: 500

Source: OCED PISA 2006

http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/42/8/39700724.pdf

Estonia, Lichtenstein, Netherlands, Slovenia, United Kingdom, Austria, Ireland, Belgium, Hong Kong - China, Mcao-China, Hungry, Poland, Czech Republic, France, Latvia, Icelad, Croatia all were ahead of us...

The saving grace --- the Russian Federation as 10 below us...

And this was 3 years ago...

Status of science education on the decline
By: Ben Feller (Associated Press)
Posted: 7/5/04

http://www.dailytexanonline.com/home/index...87-83a3c121e77f

WASHINGTON - Many educators and employers liken the state of science education to a chemistry project gone awry: A bad mix of factors has come together and it spells trouble.

By law, making students better at reading and math is the nation's priority. When it comes to science, however, a quiet crisis is engulfing schools, say scientists, educators, business leaders and entrepreneurs.

It begins when young students skip challenging science courses and later produces an understaffed or ill-trained corps of science instructors. The result is lagging U.S. performance in jobs, research and innovation.

"The public is not hearing this," said Gerald Wheeler, a nuclear physicist and executive director of the National Science Teachers Association.

"It's troubling that at one level, we understand that we live in a technological society, but it's not playing out that way. Science is on the back burner."

Not everyone is pessimistic. The country remains a dominant force in the advancement of science. Also, some observers say the picture of an "emerging and critical" problem in the labor force, as it was put by the government advisory National Science Board, is overblown.

But teachers in the field say they need help, mainly in professional training and enough class time to be creative.

"Is the goal now a set of scores or is the goal a set of scientists?" said Janis Elliott, who teaches physics at a high school in Bellevue, Neb. "That's the difference, and you don't achieve those goals in the same way."

Department of Education leaders say science is not a second-class subject. They have led efforts aimed at improving teachers' skills, and they are watching for results. By 2007, under the No Child Left Behind law, all schools must test students in science at least once in elementary, middle and high school.

The science news of late has not been uplifting, from national test scores to teachers' confidence in their science skills and parents' satisfaction in course offerings. Business leaders say they have seen declining interest in science among students.

"It's going to cause a steady weakening of U.S. leadership in technology and related fields," said Gary Bloom, chief executive of the Veritas software company and one of several technology executives to ask Congress to put greater focus on science in schools. "More and more creativity, new ideas, patents, engineering and businesses will begin to creep overseas."

But in today's schools, teachers see problems even in finding time to plan and set up a science lesson in class.

Improving training is essential if those with science backgrounds are to stick with teaching over more lucrative jobs, said Sandy Sullivan, an elementary school teacher from Ashburn, Va. "That's important in any subject, but especially science," she said, "because it can be left behind."

Purdue President Martin C. Jischke made these comments on Jan. 24, 2006, during a meeting of the Lafayette Rotary.
http://www.purdue.edu/UNS/html3month/2006/...hke.rotary.html

Science education in United States reaches a crossroads
Good afternoon. Thank you for the opportunity to speak with you today.
I am a Rotarian. I believe in the work that Rotary is doing.

Rotary efforts have important focuses on youth, education and international exchanges. That is why I have chosen this opportunity to talk with you today about the future of our nation and the dreams for our future.

We are at a crossroads in our nation as we enter a century that we know will be dominated by science, engineering, technology and education. A convergence of science, technology and engineering is taking place. And this convergence is about to change the world.

At Purdue today, we are working in the nanoscale in a brand-new $58 million nanotechnology center.

Nanotechnology is a science in which new materials and tiny structures are built atom-by-atom or molecule-by-molecule. We are talking about computers smaller than your wristwatch.

We have linked our nanotechnology center with a new $15 million bioscience center.

In the biosciences we are talking about placing devices into your body that not only will determine what is wrong with you — they will fix it!

It is exciting and incredible!

And yet, at a point in time when science, technology and engineering are opening all these incredible potentials, the United States is falling behind in the production of graduates in these fields.

Indeed, if current trends continue, by 2010, only four years from now, more than 90 percent of all scientists and engineers in the world will live in Asia.

This is technology a deficit. It is being called a "gathering storm."

Just as people on our Gulf Coast must prepare for a gathering hurricane before it makes landfall, we must address this technology deficit before it is too late. And the force for strengthening our nation in this gathering storm lies in education.

We think of the United States today as the land of promise and opportunity. And it is.

Education is the cornerstone of that promise and opportunity. But it has not always been within the grasp of common men and women.

In the 18th century, when this nation was founded, educational opportunities were limited.

The real promise and opportunity that are the hallmarks of this nation emerged from a consensus that grew among the people to make higher education available to everyone.

In the mid-1800s, Justin Morrill, a Vermont congressman, led a movement that believed higher education should not be limited to an elite group defined by wealth. Morrill, and others like him, believed higher education should be available to all the masses of people.

It was a turning point in history when President Abraham Lincoln signed the Morrill Land-Grant Act of 1862. That act provided the means for states to create new universities dedicated to learning, discovery, and engagement — all for the public good.

Within eight years, 37 states had initiated these institutions of higher learning — among them, Purdue.

Today, there are more than 100 land-grant colleges and universities swept across the breadth of this great country, offering promise and opportunity to all.

But still, by 1940 only two out of five Americans had been educated past the eighth grade. In 1940, only 16 percent of Americans 18 to 21 years of age were enrolled in universities.

Today, almost 67 percent of U.S. high school graduates from the class of 2004 enrolled in colleges and universities.

This dramatic change in higher education was sparked by the G.I. Bill at the end of World War II. The G.I. Bill provided funds making it possible to educate huge numbers of individuals who never before even considered attending college.

The G.I. Bill educated a generation.

The enormous economic growth and social advancements that fueled the 20th century took place predominantly after World War II. That is when the G.I. Bill educated people in the emerging technologies of the day.

Who were these people?

They were people like Kenneth Johnson, who grew up on remote farms in Arkansas and Missouri and went to a one-room schoolhouse surrounded by mud. He came to Purdue on the G.I. Bill, graduated with a degree in engineering, and went on to help revolutionize airplane engine technology working for General Electric.

They were people like Billy Christensen, who finished his studies at Purdue in 1950 on the G.I. Bill and took a job with a punch card company. He went on to become vice president and general manager of the international arm of that company — IBM.

They were people like Bill Rose, who barely survived the Depression before he went to war and then came to Purdue on the G.I. Bill fresh out of the Navy. He graduated and took a job in the Joint Long-Range Proving Ground at the Banana River Naval Station. We know it today as the Kennedy Space Center.

The G.I. Bill was an investment in people and education that has paid for itself many times over.

The Morrill Land-Grant Act of the 19th century and the G.I. Bill of the 20th were education-focused legislation that changed America. And there was one more.

In 1957 the Russians beat us into space with Sputnik. Many of you remember this and the widespread fears of the time that American was falling behind in science, engineering and technology.

In response to this the United States launched a satellite in 1958 and also determined to put a man into space.

The space race was on.

But we did more than that. We invested in education. We invested to ensure that a generation of young people — people like you and me would be sparked by the potentials and possibilities that emerge from science, technology and engineering.

In 1958 Congress passed the National Defense Education Act.

The National Defense Education Act included: support for loans to college students; the improvement of science, mathematics, and foreign language instruction in elementary and secondary schools; graduate fellowships; and vocational-technical training.

What was the impact of all of this?

Several years ago, the National Academy of Engineering listed the top engineering achievements of the 20th century. They are a stunning glimpse into the progress of human civilization. Purdue engineer Neil Armstrong was the keynote speaker when the list was announced.

Here are the top achievements that changed the way we lived and worked in the 20th century: electrification, automobiles, airplanes, water supply, electronics, radio and television, agricultural mechanization, computers, telephones, air conditioning, interstate highways, the Internet, imaging, health technologies, petrochemical technologies, lasers and fiber optics, nuclear technologies, and high-performance materials.

Close your eyes and try to imagine our world today without these contributions from engineers as well as those from scientists. These are advancements that took us from the horse-and-buggy age at the dawn of the 20th century to the space age and the exploration of Mars and other planets at the dawn of the 21st.

It is clear that American investments in higher education — and most especially investments in science, math, engineering and technology — played a major role in creating this great nation and all the comforts and benefits that we enjoy.

But we have lapsed, and lapsed dramatically in a remarkably short period of time.

Twenty years ago, the United States, Japan and China each graduated a similar number of engineers, and more than twice the total coming out of South Korea.

By the year 2000: Chinese engineering graduates had increased 161 percent to 207,500; Japanese engineering graduates had increased 42 percent to 103,200; South Korean engineering graduated had increased 140 percent to 56,500; and credible and in fact very conservative estimates place India’s production of engineers today at more than 100,000 per year.

Meanwhile U.S. engineering graduates have declined 20 percent to 59,500.

A recent study out of Duke University has challenged some of these statistics by comparing quality of education and the number of years of training to receive an engineering degree in various nations.

But it has not challenged the heart of this message: We are falling behind in the production of people in science, engineering, technology and math, which is at the core of all three.

Our middle school and high school students are unprepared in math and science and correspondingly uninterested in these careers.

Of the nearly 1.1 million U.S. high school seniors who took the college entrance exam in 2002, less than 6 percent had plans to study engineering. That is a 33 percent decrease from 10 years earlier.

Meanwhile, more than 50 percent of the current U.S. science and engineering work force is approaching retirement.

What is the impact of this?

New York Times columnist and author Thomas Freedman writes that a new world has emerged, a "flat world," leveled by technology.

Norman R. Augustine, retired chairman and chief executive officer of Lockheed Martin Corporation, chaired the Committee on Prospering in the Global Economy of the 21st Century. This was a committee of the National Academies, the advisors to the nation on science, engineering and medicine.

Here are some of the points made by Norman Augustine in his testimony October 20 to the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Science:

"U.S. companies each morning receive software that was written in India overnight in time to be tested in the U.S. and returned to India for further production that same evening — making the 24-hour workday a practicality.

"Drawings for American architectural firms are produced in Brazil. U.S. firms’ call centers are based in India — where employees are now being taught to speak with a Midwestern accent. U.S. hospitals have X-rays and CAT scans read by radiologists in Australia and India. Accounting firms in the U.S. have clients’ tax returns prepared by experts in India. Visitors to an office not far from the White House are greeted by a receptionist on a flat screen display who controls access to the building and arranges contacts. She is in Pakistan.

"For the cost of one engineer in the United States, a company can hire 11 in India.

"Chemical companies closed seventy facilities in the U.S. in 2004, and have tagged 40 more for shutdown. Of 120 new chemical plants being built around the world with price tags of $1 billion or more, one is in the U.S. and 50 are in China.

"The United States today is a net importer of high-technology products."

Just as there is a convergence of technologies, there is a convergence of four trends impacting our nation today.

First, we are experiencing a decline in the number of American students enrolling in our engineering and science programs.

Second, we are experiencing a decline in federal research support for engineering and the physical sciences. Since 1970, U.S. funding for basic research in the physical sciences has declined by half as a percentage of the gross domestic product.

Third, since 9/11 we have experienced a decline in international enrollment. We are losing many top students from the around the world who not only have invigorated our academic programs but have challenged and motivated our American students.

And fourth, other nations — especially in Asia — are aggressively increasing research funding, enrollments and the quality of programs at universities.

China, for example, plans to increase the proportion of science spending devoted to basic research by more than 200 percent in the next 10 years.

At Purdue we had the first computer science department in the nation. Undergraduate enrollment in that program has dropped 47 percent in four years.

Purdue is a top 10 engineering college. Every year applications to our engineering graduate programs decline another 25 to 30 percent.

The shortfall of U.S. students and workers in science and engineering has traditionally been met by internationals who studied in the U.S. and often joined our work force.

Where would we be without them?

Thirty percent of Purdue faculty members are foreign-born, including 47.9 percent of our engineering and science faculty.

In a post-9/11 world, the way people in other nations perceive us, coupled with our immigration policies, is negatively impacting international enrollment and the U.S. international work force. International enrollment, after many years of steady growth, dropped 2.4 percent two years ago and 1.3 percent last year.

The decline in international enrollment now seems to be slowing. We are hopeful we have turned the corner.

Purdue ranks third in the nation in international enrollment behind only the University of Southern California and the University of Illinois.

But even as we work every hard to increase our international enrollment, we continue to face enormous competition for international students from Great Britain, New Zealand, Australia and Canada.

I have also been to India and China in the past year to see the tremendous advances in their universities and research. The speed of change abroad, especially China and India, is quite amazing. At Tsinghua, the MIT of China, a whole new south campus is being built with both government and private resources.

Similar changes are taking place at Fudan and elsewhere.

And these universities are hiring Chinese and others from the United States. The first Western department head at Tsinghua is a Purdue faculty member.

Purdue and other universities have implemented programs reaching out to high school, junior high and grade school students to interest them in science and engineering. We have launched programs to increase the number of teachers in these fields and to improve our curricula. We are looking at the engineering needs of the 21st century and will redesign our program to train that person.

The National Academies report, Rising Above the Gathering Storm: Energizing and Employing America for a Brighter Economic Future," proposes a number of initiatives to meet the technology deficit.

The recommendations include awarding scholarships to recruiting science and mathematics teachers. In return for the scholarships, the students would commit to five years of teaching in public K-12 schools.

Other proposals call for programs to upgrade the skills of current math and science teachers. The recommendations include strengthening our commitment to long-term basic research. The recommendations also suggest investments in "high-risk, high pay-off" research.

In spite of all these concerns, American higher education continues to be the best in the world. We can meet and overcome these challenges. It is not too late.

We can maintain our worldwide lead even as other countries invest heavily to build up their own high-technology sectors.

We absolutely can do it. But to succeed, we will need a national consensus, just as we needed popular support for the Land Grant Act, the G.I. Bill and the National Defense Education Act. We can inspire a whole new generation of young people to the incredible opportunities in science, engineering, technology and math.

And the returns on our investment will be gigantic.

It will be a stronger nation and a world filled with breath-taking advances in medicine, science and engineering — breakthroughs that are beyond our dreams today.

President Dwight Eisenhower was not an engineer. But he certainly understood the importance of engineering in everything from the D-Day invasion to building the interstate highway system, which he launched in the 1950s.

President Eisenhower said: "Engineers build for the future, not merely for the needs of men (and women), but for their dreams as well."

The dreams for the future of America are studying in our schools today.

It is our job to inspire and to provide them with the resources they need to succeed. We must begin building for tomorrow today!

With your help we will succeed.

Thank you.

MARCH 16, 2004

SPECIAL REPORT: AMERICA'S TECH MIGHT: SLIPPING?
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/con..._0601_tc166.htm

America's Failure in Science Education
The shortage of science and technology grads threatens the U.S. economy, and Washington's help is badly needed to tackle the problem
For anyone concerned about strengthening America's long-term leadership in science and technology, the nation's schools are an obvious place to start. But brace yourself for what you'll find. The depressing reality is that when it comes to educating the next generation in these subjects, America is no longer a world contender. In fact, U.S. students have fallen far behind their competitors in much of Western Europe and in advanced Asian nations like Japan and South Korea.

This trend has disturbing implications not just for the future of American technological leadership but for the broader economy. Already, "we have developed a shortage of highly skilled workers and a surplus of lesser-skilled workers," warned Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan in a Mar. 12 address at Boston College. And the problem is worsening. "[We're] graduating too few skilled workers to address the apparent imbalance between the supply of such workers and the burgeoning demand for them," Greenspan added.

As a result, "the future strength of the U.S. science and engineering workforce is imperiled," the National Science Board warned in a sweeping report issued last year.

GLOBAL COMPETITION. Until now, America has compensated for its failure to adequately educate the next generation by importing brainpower. In 2000, a stunning 38% of U.S. jobs requiring a PhD in science or technology were filled by people who were born abroad, up from 24% in 1990, according to the NSB. Similarly, doctoral positions at the nation's leading universities are often filled with foreign students.

However, because the "the global competition for science and engineering talent is intensifying...the U.S. may not be able to rely on the international market to fill our unmet needs," warns the NSB. Indeed, as globalization accelerates, bright young Indian or Chinese scientists may well have better opportunities at home than in the U.S.

The consequences of this could be enormous. Because the quality of a nation's workforce has such a huge influence on productivity, effective school reform could easily stimulate the economy more than conventional strategies, such as the Bush tax cuts. Consider what would happen if the U.S. could raise the performance of its high school students on math and science to the levels of Western Europe within a decade. According to Eric A. Hunushek, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, U.S. gross domestic product growth would then be 4% higher than otherwise by 2025 and 10% higher in 30 years.

That may not sound like much. But Hanushek figures that the 4% annual increase alone would be enough to offset the entire cost of America's public K-12 school system for the same year.

SCIENCE LEFT BEHIND. Here's where the problem begins with science education: By the time U.S. students reach their senior year of high school, they rank below their counterparts in 17 other countries in math and science literacy, according to the Third International Mathematics and Science Study, completed in 1996-97, the largest international study of student achievement ever conducted. In physics, U.S. high school seniors scored last among 16 countries tested.

Ironically, President Bush's education-reform initiative, No Child Left Behind, may be exacerbating the problem, at least for now. Because NCLB now requires that students be tested just in reading and math (science tests won't be added until 2007), "some teachers are being told to stop teaching science and get back to reading and math," complains Gerald Wheeler, executive director of the National Science Teachers Assn., which represents more than 50,000 science teachers.

One result is that most high school graduates aren't adequately prepared for college-level science courses. Indeed, the NSTA reports that just 26% of 2003 high school graduates scored high enough on the ACT science test to have a good chance of completing a first-year college science course. That's one reason why enrollments of U.S. students in science and engineering majors has been flat or declining -- even as demand for many of these skills increases.

ILL-EQUIPPED TEACHERS. The upshot: The U.S. now ranks below 13 other countries - -- including Japan, Germany, and South Korea -- in the percentage of 24-year olds with a college degree in these subjects, down from third place 25 years ago. You don't have to be a scientist to recognize that the status quo is a recipe for big trouble -- or that reversing this slide will require stronger federal leadership and more money.

Consider one root cause of the problem: The severe shortage of qualified science teachers. An astonishing 28% of those who teach at least one science class in 7th to 12th grades don't have a major or minor in science, according to Richard M. Ingersoll, an education professor at the University of Pennsylvania. Moreoever, even those who have a science degree are often teaching outside their area of expertise. In the physical sciences -- including chemistry and physics -- 60% of the instructors don't have a major or minor in the subjects they teach.

Earlier this year, The Teaching Comission, headed by former IBM Chairman Louis Gerstner, argued in a report that the U.S. must pay science teachers more if it hopes to solve this problem. But that isn't likely to happen without leadership from Washington. As things stand now, science graduates simply have too many lucrative alternatives to teaching.

As America sleeps, other nations that have long since recognized the critical importance of science and technology education to their futures are moving ahead. The U.S. has grasped this lesson in many Olympic sports, where strong national programs have been established to ensure that America has world-class athletes. Unless the nation applies the same approach to science education, it stands to lose far more than a few gold medals. It could ultimately squander its leadership of the world economy.

Universities respond to decline in computer science students
By Ryan Paul | Published: May 29, 2007 - 09:49AM CT

It's no secret that there are fewer undergraduate students majoring in computer science today than there were in the late '90s. The Computing Research Association's statistics show that the number of freshman who list computer science as a probable major has fallen by 70 percent since 2000. According to the Associated Press, universities are responding to this trend by attempting to spice up computer science education and make it more appealing to incoming students.

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One example is Georgia Tech's new robotics program, which uses an inexpensive programmable robot called the Scribbler to encourage hands-on learning. The Scribbler, which can be programmed to draw shapes and navigate through obstacle courses, is relatively compact and costs only $75.

In addition to formulating curricula that are more colorful and engaging, universities are also offering new programs that focus on multimedia or web development, topics that are becoming increasingly relevant for many contemporary computer programmers. These are also the skills that students are most likely to have developed before heading off to college, and so it forms a natural bridge into the computing sciences.

I have less than fond memories of my own experiences with computer science education. I was frustrated with the emphasis on niche commercial development tools that I had never used before and have rarely used since. I also got frustrated with the emphasis on technical minutiae that aren't particularly relevant to general application development. Assembly programming and compiler design skills acquired in college aren't going to be very useful for software developers who enter the workforce and get paid to write web applications with ASP.NET or Ruby on Rails. That particular problem could largely be resolved by the emergence of new academic programs that differentiate between computer science and web application development. Few schools do this, however.


Improvements to computer science education are being touted as a way to prevent the United States from continuing to lose relevance in the technology industry, a problem that is also becoming pervasive across the board in other fields relating to math and science. Although increasing the number of computer science students could make the United States more competitive in the tech industry, there are other factors that should be included as well. Encouraging students to become technology entrepreneurs isn't going to do much good if abusive patent litigation, for instance, prevents them from innovating and developing products. Refactoring computer science education is a step in the right direction, but other reforms are needed as well.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070...e-students.html

The culture in this country is the problem, students won't learn what they don't value. "You don't have to know anything, just have a smart mouth, talk a lot, and act like yer so smart.

Doesn't that sound familiar here on these threads, its not just the students who have been struck stupid. Look around here.


It really is all about family values.

This has been a problem for a long time. When I graduated from High School I'd say I was functionally illiterate in math, reading, and science. Who fault was that? I'd say it was mine because I'd get passed to the next grade for being lazy so I saw no need to work hard.

The first year I went to college I was rudely awaken just how stupid I was. I had to go to tutors just to learn the basics in mathematics. Then in one of my courses I had to go tell the professor I was falling through my butt because I didn't know what a lot of the words meant in the text book. He told me to go buy a dictionary and look it up everytime a word stumped me. Science was another agony, Chemistry 101 ate my lunch.

After the first year things got better, I learned knowledge just doesn't flow into your head like osmosis. I learned I had to set asise a sufficient time every day and do my studying. I ended up with over 350 college credit hours and after the first year I made real close to a strait A average. I developed habits which inabled me to score high enough on both the GMAT and the LSAT to get into a couple of pretty impressive Universities. But public school sure didn't tell me what I needed to do to use my brain.

The US has the best higher education system in the world. Where do all of the teachers come from. I think we just let everyone take these tests they are talking about. In other countries not everyone goes to high school like in the US. The dumb kids are diverted to trade jobs.

Marine and Mac2 --- actually hit the nail on the head here.

Part of it is the lazyness of teachers --- and part of it is the culture.

Bright students are treated differently in other countries. Students who show an aptitude for science at a young age are encouraged. We do not encurage our students like they do.

It is similar to athletics where Russian athletes would be sent away to develop their talents. So were their bright students. Now the Russian FEderation is below the US in science scores --- but China is doing well.

I think we could learn from those countries and perhaps develop national schools for bright students and promote support for these students even if they come from modest families.

Our society definitely needs to value intelligence more at an early age.

As for the lazyness of teachers that is a harder nut to crack since there is a scarcity of teachers and the unions are so strong.

BUt it is definitely a problem with demands attention.

Common ground here...

The US does not have less bright students then foreign countries. Its the way the stats are compiled. Like I said its who is allowed to take the tests. The US tries to educate everyone as a public policy. That gives the less gifted among us the axcess to the test in question. In addition I might add that teaching in the US is not looked upon as a profession that has great rewards or respect. Until that changes we get what we pay for.

That may be -- but there is a serious decline in interest in science in the US...particualrly among girls --- and I also do not believe that our talent is harnessed as well as it should be. Many of our brightest students do not even go to college...

What Keeps Girls Out of Science




WASHINGTON, D.C.--If only Bill Nye, the Science Guy, were a girl.

Attracting more U.S. women into science will require a change in the culture that assumes girls are less capable than boys of doing science and entering the profession. That's a primary message in a new report, "Balancing the Equation," that concludes progress toward equity in science, engineering, and technology over the past decade has been disappointing slow.

"Change is possible, but our efforts have been sporadic and disjointed," says Linda Basch, executive director of the National Council for Research on Women, an alliance of 95 university research centers and institutions that issued the report yesterday. "There is still a leaky pipeline throughout the educational system and into the workforce." As examples, she and others cite a steep decline, from 37% to 20% over the last 15 years, in the share of undergraduate computer science degrees going to women and the fact that women researchers say balancing work and family is becoming more difficult.


One serious leak occurs early in education. Speaking at a press conference here, physicist Sally Ride, the first U.S. woman in space, said that many girls still face "subtle obstacles" that block their path into science--from teachers who put more credence in answers from boys to school counselors that discourage girls from taking advanced math courses. "Until we get the cultural perceptions changed," she said, "we're going to face continued underrepresentation of women in science." Ride is head of a new educational media company, Imaginary Lines Inc. of La Jolla, California, that is trying to draw middle-school girls into science clubs, festivals, and contests.


In addition to creating opportunities for girls, researchers say that school reformers should also focus on building self-confidence. "Even when girls get A's in math and science, studies show that they don't think they understand the subject," says Carol Burger, head of a science and gender equity program at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in Blacksburg. "And those doubts make them more likely to drop out of science."


--JEFFREY MERVIS


http://www.bric.postech.ac.kr/science/97no...ow/010718c.html

I think the fact that our aptitude in science is declining is strong evidence of why we need a liberal immigration policy because many of our best scientists now come from overseas -- exchange students...we need to keep that option open.

Science ability drops in U.S. high schools
By Sam DillonPublished: THURSDAY, MAY 25, 2006
http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/05/25/news/science.php

WASHINGTON: The first science test administered in five years across the United States shows that achievement among high school seniors has declined across the past decade, even as scores in science rose among fourth-graders and held steady among eighth-graders, the U.S. Department of Education has reported.

The falling average science test scores among high school students, announced Wednesday, appeared certain to increase anxiety about Americanacademic competitiveness and to add new urgency to calls from President George W. Bush, governors and philanthropists like Bill Gates for an overhaul of American high schools.

The drop in science proficiency appeared to reflect a broader trend in which some academic gains made in elementary grades and middle school have been seen to fade during the high school years.The science results come from the National Assessment of Educational Progress, a comprehensive examination administered in early 2005 by the Department of Education to more than 300,000 students in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and on U.S. military bases around the world.

"Our fourth-graders are doing better - that's the good news," said DarvinWinick, chairman of the bipartisan body set up by Congress to oversee the test. "But the 12th-grade results are distressing, there's no other way to slice it."

The science test, which was administered during the first months of 2005,covered the earth, physical and life sciences, and was last given in 2000 and in 1996. The test administrators translate scores into three achievement levels: advanced, proficient and basic.

Today in Americas

On the most recent test, 68 percent of fourth-graders achieved at or above the basic level, compared to 63 percent on the 2000 and 1996 tests.

The rising science achievement among fourth graders mirrored similar trends on nationwide reading and math tests released last fall. In interviews, analysts attributed those increases to the broad movements for higher standards and accountability that began in most states during the 1990s and gained force when Bush signed the No Child Left Behind law in 2002.

Eighth-grade scores were largely unchanged from 10 years ago, with 59 percent of students scoring at or above the basic level in 2005, while 60 percent of students were at or above basic in 1996.Officials called those results disappointing, but the results from secondary schools were worse.

Among high school seniors, 54 percent performed at or above the basic level in science in 2005, compared to 57 percent in 1996. Eighteen percent of high school students performed at the proficient level in 2005, down from 21 percent in 1996.

To achieve at the basic level on the National Assessment, high school seniors must demonstrate knowledge of very basic concepts about the earth, physical and life sciences, and show a rudimentary understanding of scientific principles.

There was some debate about how to explain the 12th-grade declines.Assistant Secretary of Education Tom Luce said they reflected a national shortage of fully qualified science teachers, especially in poor regions, where physics and chemistry classes are often taught by teachers untrained in those subjects.

"We lack enough teachers with content knowledge in math and science," Luce said. "We have too few teachers with majors or minors in math and science. That clearly is a problem."

Michael Padilla, a professor at the University of Georgia who is president of the National Science Teachers Association, said that the problem is not that universities are failing to train sufficient numbers of science majors or that too few opt for classroom careers, but that about a third of those who accept teaching jobs abandon the profession within five years.

"What happens is that the system tends to beat them down," Padilla said. "Working conditions are poor, it's a difficult job, and the pay isn't that great."

but I thought no child left behind was the solution. Oh right that was just to get the military in our school system

Only a small portion of the population is capable of doing science. You have to have the capability of doing high level math. High school and the university experience weeds out those who cant do it. That is why those science tests are silly.

NCLB was supposed to provide a system for measuring education performance --- but in reality it provided a means of dumbing down education...

And David --- how do you know that science ability to achieve is best weeded out in college ---

I believe that many kids have ability to achieve in science demonstrated in a much earlier age which is not enhanced and encouraged and as a result we lose many future scientists that way...

I think we need a system of elite schools to help develop our children who show a particular aptitude in math and science.

Yep, immigration is the answer.

We developed the atomic bomb from guys fleeing the Nazis, then we developed the rockets to deliver the atomic bombs from grabbing some of the Nazis for our rocket program.

This is such a multi-faceted problem, it cannot be answered with simplistic answers like "teacher are lazy" or "kids don't want to learn." We can't entirely blame NCLB, because this trend has been going on for decades.

I am a product of the public school system in a rural, agricultural County in Florida. I graduated with a class of 36, from a school of less than 600 K-12. I went to college. I was thoroughly prepared in math and reading. My major required a lot of science - it was a rude awakening! The most intimidating thing about science in college was the labs. I could learn anything from a book. But a true understanding of science requires an understanding of concepts that are best taught through hands on, trial and error. I had no labs in what is now called middle school. I did have some labs in high school, but they were woefully inadequate. I thought to myself, something needs to be done about this!

I have been teaching science now, in Florida, for the past 20 years. I see the problem from the other side, and the causes are many, solutions hard.

Time - Up until 3 years ago the average length of class was in the 45 min range. This hinders thought provoking labs that require critical thinking. With lab set up, take down and clean up, the number of minutes available were minimal. The solution to that problem was to go to a block schedule. Block is a science teachers dream, but all subject areas do not feel that way. Next year we will be accountable for the class size amendment in Florida. As a result, this may be the last year of block.

Class size - I'm comfortable with a class size of around 25. There have been years when I have had many more. This causes varied problems (lack of supplies, space, safety, discipline).

Money - I have a budget of $200 per year, the same as any other teacher at my school. Some years I may get up to $150 more from the County for strictly consumable supplies. I end up supplementing with my own money - a lot.

Expectations - During the first several years of FCAT, science wasn't even on the radar. Everything was math and reading, reading and math. It wasn't until the state began to hold schools accountable for science and make it a part of their school grade, that everybody started jumping on the science bandwagon. Doors opened up for teacher training. Notice I said that schools were accountable - not students. Students are not accountable in science until they are juniors, and by then it is too late.

Discipline - I have been teaching since 1983. Times have changed, schools have changed, communities have changed, parents have changed, students have changed. I see behaviors today that I didn't see years ago. There's a boldness on the part of some students, an audacity that has been growing and getting worse year to year. I have a class of eighth graders that I have to line up on a wall in the hallway of my building, while I monitor students between bells. I cannot let them enter on their own, because they have no self control. If my thumb in not firmly pressed every minute of the class period, they would be chasing each other around the room and hanging from the lights. These are students I'm supposed to let work in groups as they do labs? Not if I value safety in the laboratory.


I could go on and on. But at this point I'd like to point out that there are some excellent teachers in the public school system. Those potentially good teachers we lose after a few years, leave for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is money. They also feel restricted by the State Standards and smothered by the amount of paperwork we do in addition to our teaching duties. I might add that a lot of what is mandated to happen in a public school is a result of legislation passed by the State and Federal government. Many of those making decisions have not been in the classroom since they graduated and/or have no teaching experience whatsoever.

And isn't it just so easy to blame everything on the union? How typical and how ignorant. There is a process in place that administrators can use to replace teachers. The process is necessarily lengthy to protect those teachers that might be targets of administrators, not for how they do their jobs, but for personality or other types of conflicts.

So that about sums up my take on the issue. Of course, I'm on the inside looking out, and the view from there is a lot different,

If i was asked what the problem is I'd say our public schools are all just too big.

Years ago my Dad graduated from a public school as the valedictorian of his class, he was number one out of 17 kids in that graduating class. Every kid knew every kid in the school and best of all every teacher knew every kid. There wasn't anyway a kid could hide that he wasn't learning. And my Dad was pretty smart too, I never saw anything he couldn't reason out.

When I graduated from the same school district 38 years later I'd guess there was 600 kids in my graduating class. Three quarters or better of the kids I didn't know and I'd bet the teachers didn't know them either. My personal experience was it was easy to slack off and be lazy because I was just another face in the crowd. When I graduated I was very ill prepared and I didn't even know it.

Eight years after I joined the Marines i decided I should go to college, boy was I surprised. I found out PDQ that I was the biggest dummy in every class I signed up for.

I think someone ought to do a study on school size just to see how the little bitty rural schools stack up against the mega metropolitan behemoths.

Taz the answer to your question is simple. If you cannot do caculus you cannot do science. Thats your freshman year of college in the science majors and the engineering majors. I know because my son found out he was not going to be an engineer because of math in college. He had a 1340 in the old SAT. However his talent lie in the verbal section of the SAT where he got a 730 score. He finally graduated as a Political science major. Not everyone has the talent for science no matter how smart you are. My son's IQ is 137. He is looking at Law School.

Marine you are correct that schools are too big. They have become efficient factories. My son's HS graduating class was 650 people. The teachers did not know their students. My son was an underperformer and most teachers thought he was dumb. That was because he was quiet and did not talk much. His english teacher in HS was shocked that he scored 1340 in his SAT. Thats in the upper 2% of the test takers. The same teacher was suprised that he was accepted in the same college that the teacher graduated from. I think the big schools do not serve any one well. They are cheap to operate on that scale but at what price to the student.

The reason they are so cheap to operate is because the facilities themselves are so expensive.

In Florida, where FCAT has been king for years, we are still graduating seniors that have to take remedial reading classes before they take their regular college classes. This is a big problem. Yet these same students are passing the FCAT in reading, and so receive a high school diploma. There seems to be a disconnect between "acceptable" reading for the FCAT, and the reading that colleges require. This is ironic, because Florida has gutteed it's secondary level vocational programs, and now treats all students as if they were all going to go to college.

Many such studies have been done. There is a curvilenear relationship between school size and
average student achievement. Very small schools and very large school do worse than moderate sized schools. The relationship is statistically significant by accounts for a very moderate amount
achievement variance. Variables such as socio-economic level, parent involvement, and Teacher
preparation are much better predictors. One of the major problems is lack of community integration
which interfers with community-based education. Children from very diverse neighbors are
bused to large ware housing facilities, where they are dumped together and left on their own to
develop survival skills, which may or may not work in the larger community. (I was the top graduate of a 9 member graduating class. I had a hard time getting through College Algera
and didn't take any additional math in college. Subsequently, I had a difficult time with all the
statistics courses I had to take in graduate scxhool.

David:

I have to respectfully disagree with you again.

When I went to school some thrity some years ago Calculus was not offered at all high schools --- but now precalc and calculus is offered in high school. If your son wanted to be an engineering major he would have taken it in high school. Kids who enter college now without calculus in HS find themselves behind the curve in college if they are pursuing a math or science major.

Amd David, I agree with you that not every child has an aptitude for science. That was not my point if you reread what I said. I believe that we have to harness the ability of students who demonstrate it at an early age --- which I would contend is grammar school and help them to explore that talent as well.

Marine raises a good point about class size. I also believe that when his father went to school both parents were not working and there were a lot less single parent homes. This is why I think developing programs with super schools at an early age could be beneficial. If a child demonstrates an advanced aptitude for science he could be placed in an environment to succeed whether he was from a single parent home or not. We need to act at an early age before children buy into the social connections that come in the teen years and

My nephew has demonstrated an aptitude across the board getting As throughout grammar school, and junior high. He got into high school and lost interest in school preferring to hang out with his friends. Now it is unlikely that he may even go to college -- but he certainly has the ability. He never learned the proper way to apply himself. I am certain he is not alone.

Our youth is our future. Not just our future leaders --- but our future inventors and technology superstars. We have to create an environment that supports their growth and helps them to be all they can be. Other nations like Russia and China have excelled at supporting their brightest students. The US has not. Because our society places a premium on leisure time, are youth are growing up with a predisposition to having things handed to them.

I have read about parents going on job interviews for their kids and sending out their job applications -- etc.

Kids are so dependent on cell phones and being in constant communication that they are not learning how to make decisions on their own.

Something has to be done stem this tide toward interdependence so that children can develop to effective contributors in our society or 20-40 years from now our nation will not have the work force to compete globally.

Taz I will go back to my original argument that other countries do education in a different manner as you stated above. The US system tries to educate everyone at about the same level. Some kids are late developers and win with the US system. Some kids need development through the whole process. Because of our democratic tendencies we try to make everyone equal and provide the same level of education for everyone. I am not sure that it is a good thing to make life time decisions about people in grade school like other countries do. If pressed I do not know which system works best for the overall society. But for the individual the US system is prob better.

david, you are offering one interpretation of Democracy and then hypothesizing that, that
model of Democracy is not optimum for Human Development. Yes, this model of democracy is frequently applied and probably is one of the ways that Human Development goes astray, in our social system...the problem is that there are an infinite number of ways human development can go astray...On the positive side there are relatively few ways, at a given Time & Place, that Human Development can proceed optimally...Humanitarian, Constitutional Democracy, when adequately defined, provides the best known Social System for optimizing human development...

Both my daughters went to a number of different schools. Both myself and my wife keep ourselves as involved as possible.

I remember one school my daughter was not doing to well in so we went in for a parent/teacher conference. I left that conference wishing I could a got away with choking that teacher to the floor. I'm a Marine and my wife is an American Indian so I guess this guy figured we were both mental midgets and I never seen such a condescending SOB ever before in my life. We were lectured that people such as us should not expect to have a genius for a child.

Well, I have two Bachelors degrees and a Masters and my wife has two Bachelors and two Masters all of which were obtained from a more prestigious schools than this fellow could a ever hoped to have gone to. We may a looked like Ma & Pa Kettle but we both valued education.

The following year that state started requiring teachers to be tested annually to retain their teaching certificate; it did my heart good when I heard that SOB was incapable of passing the test and could no longer teach.

Moderate quantity and highest possible quality Teaching is what every human learner needs more than anything else...

It is not possible to successfully teach students who place little or no value on education.


Time doesn't much matter, quality of teaching doesn't much matter, investment of money doesn't much matter, the education policies and laws of local, state and federal governments also do not much matter.


Sad, but true.........and not reasonably arguable.

Mac2, in my personal and professional judgement, your statement contains little truth value.
I refer you to the thread on Education.

Which of the threads under education?

Mac2:

Certainly an individuals desire to learn is important.

This is why I suggest we need to test the aptitude of our children at an early age and if we find that they possess special skilles then they should be encouraged to pursue a course of education which enhances those skills.

However, those other factors are important as well unless we are willing to tolerate an uneducated work force.

How do you deal with a person at a young age who is not interested in learning because of social factors which have nothing to do with the school?

Reagan was criticized because he cut school lunch programs which were quite important for inner city students who needed the lunch or they were distracted in class because they were hungry.

There are many factors which can stifle a student's ability to learn.

We do not accept such factors --- but rather we undertake efforts to help the child succeed despite their perceived desire to learn.

Some of our brightest students are those who gained an aptitude later in school for certain sciences --- and others have been denied opporunities because while they showed an aptitude early on it was never harnessed and encouraged.

Mac2 -- you really would improve your credibility if you did not make such sweeping statements.

Of course, this would mean that you actually have a desire to be a credible participant in discussions on this thread which few of us have actually seen, but many of us would like to.

The invitation to the dance is at your feet. All you need do is pick it up and enter...

Marine:

It certainly is a shame that there are people like that who call themselves teachers.

I am confident that your children will turn out just fine despite such bumps in the road.

I had my share of clowns teaching as well.

One teacher through a book at me for reading in class.

Others embarrassed me in grade school for not being able to keep up with other students, though, by and large I think I had great teachers...

I think some would be surprised I received a post-graduate degree...

Even in the larger high schools, one might find only one section of Calculus, depending upon the location of the school...Given the level of technology and taxation, one has a right to expect each of their Children's Lifes' to be continusously intersected with an optimum Learning Environment, from Early Childhood through early adulthood, as Individual Persons get more integrated into their own Community (with varying degrees of over-lap with Parents...)....the Narrows of the funnel aren't
letting many persons through, especially as one get's out of the racial-cultural mainstream...more
Oppenness would lead to more humanitarian and democratic outcomes.

As as teacher, I agree with you. You can solve all of the "problems," provide the optimum learning environment, have state of the art facilities, have the best teachers, and IF YOU DO NOT HAVE A CHILD THAT WANTS TO LEARN your chances of success are severly limited.

I'd rather have a classroom full of kids that may not be the "cream of the crop" by some standards, but who are excited to come to school just to find out what they'll learn that day. That's when I can truly teach.

Taz my son never had a calling to rely on for inspiration. In other words he does not know what he would like to do with his life. Most kids are like this so they try different things to see if they can find a fit. He tried computer science and electrical engineering. He tried other courses and thats why he took so long to graduate. Most people do not plan their lives in grade school. That is why he did not take higher math in HS. Your theory would apply to a small percentage of students. Most kids change their major in college let alone from the time they were in grade school.

David ---

You are absolutely right. Many youth have a lot of trouble deciding what type of career they want let alone picking a major. '

Wouldn't it have been great if your son showed an advanced aptitude in science at an early age and as a result that ability was encouraged and developed?

Well, it may seem a little big brotherish or totalitarian - but my point was to have the "state" help to make the career choice for people like your son if he demonstrated such an aptitude.

I think part of the problem that I have seen and I used to be somewhat of a teacher and have seen kids growing up around me --- and they not only lack the direction you speak of, but also are easily distracted.

They also --- as I have noted --- are becoming less adept at decisionmaking because of the advent of cell phones.

One way to help provide some focus is to do early testing for science and math proficiency. If children demonstrate such a proficiency they are enrolled in super schools to develop those skills.

Prodigies are few and fairly rare. I think they are mostly found and treated as you wish they would be treated. That is not something to build an education system around.

Your "early testing" idea is not well-formed. Keep in mind that children in their early years have the potential for rapid development. It is not wise to claasify them at this stage.

I am not talking about prodigies...I am talking about a demonstrated aptitude.

I think that there is a difference.

If nations like Russia and China can harness their youth at an early age and help them to develop, why cant we?

Perhaps it would mean building one more school in each state or turning an existing school into such a center...but I think it could go a long way toward helping to promote learning in science, math technology.

Why do we have to be resistant to approaches --- why can't we embrace new ideas.

Educators are saying that interest in science is declining, particulalry among young women.

You suggest that the report is not an accurate representation. What if it is?

What if our scientific aptitude is declining with interest.

As we move forward as a nation, we need to have more, not less students interested in the sciences. This is the only chance we have to reclaim our global competitive advantage. Otherwise, multinational companies will go to India, China, Germany and elsewhere to secure workers.

Toyota was going to open up another plant in the US and declined moving it elsewhere -- I think to Canada because in Georgia where they were looking the educational background of the workforce in the area was below par.

We need to address these problems.

Mac2:

Who said anything about classifying them?

I merely suggested that we help them to develop their aptitude if they demonstrate an above average proficiency.

They do that now with honors classes in high school.

What is wrong with starting earlier?

And if not earlier, when?

We have a declining interest in science in this nation.

How do you encourage the development of such an interest?

How do you help disadvantaged children who may be the bright shining stars scientifically speaking of the future to be able to reach their potential?

How do you see that we should retain or even reclaim our global competitive advantage in science and technology without a workforce that is capable of functioning competitively in these fields?

This is a real problem --- and your alternative ideas would be welcome.

Gov. Huck talks a good Educational Philosophy, even bringing in left and right brain hemisphere,
scientific research-based technology--though he doesn't believe in Evolution...if one took all the
scientific concepts that included the basic assumptions of Evolution from Science...there would be
hardly anything left...

You are absolutely right, rla.

That's like saying I believe in defending our nation by any means possible, except any means possible...

Taz in my experience everyone thinks their child is brilliant. If there was an elite program with the best teachers in it, most people would want their children in it. I think politics and the biggest voice would rule the day.

"One way to help provide some focus is to do early testing for science and math proficiency. If children demonstrate such a proficiency they are enrolled in super schools to develop those skills."

Its simply that you would classify some as those who demonstrate proficiency on early tests for math and science skills and enroll them in the super schools.

We need to be Guided first by the most Abstract & General System's Principles and then to more concrete & specific Applications. Diversity is additive and synergistic, relative to how well Integrated
the Social System...One big chunk of the problem is that, "Intelligence" is equated to Academic
Capability...when academic capability is only one of a set of at least seven or eight types of Intelligence...So we've built a lot of mis-information into the system...so the re-integrating
concept in the Political Environment is, "Change." The "Change" mantle is always appropriate for
challaning candidate...In this election cycle, Everyone from all parties are Challengers---in need of a Thematic Vission for Change...

Interesting article from Business Week:

The Science Education Myth
Forget the conventional wisdom. U.S. schools are turning out more capable science and engineering grads than the job market can support.

http://www.businessweek.com/smallbiz/conte...1025_827398.htm

Its an interesting article which certainly tries to draw a contrast with the conventional wisdom which I have posted here...

But the relevant part of the article excerpted below is misleading...

Why the sharp discrepancy? Salzman says that reports citing low U.S. international rankings often misinterpret the data. Review of the international rankings, which he says are all based on one of two tests, the Trends in International Mathematics & Science Study (TIMMS) or the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), show the U.S. is in a second-ranked group, not trailing the leading economies of the world as is commonly reported

Review the most recent PISA is what this is about --- and we are not ranked second.

The other problem I have is that no discussion is made regarding the decline in females.

More females than males are moving on to college nowadays --- and if they have a declining interest in science sooner or later that will catch up to us if the enrollment trends continue.

Current News
Report: College Enrollment Gender Gap Widens for White, Hispanic Students

by Shilpa Banerji
Jul 12, 2006, 06:32
http://www.diverseeducation.com/artman/pub...icle_6084.shtml

WASHINGTON

The gap between White and Hispanic undergraduates has widened, according to a new gender equity study released Tuesday by the American Council on Education.



The report traces the increased gap to a rise in the percentage of low-income female students from both races attending colleges and universities. The number of “traditional” male students, 24 years old and younger, has dipped from 48 percent in 1995 to 45 percent in 2003.



The share of bachelor’s degrees earned by minority women has tripled over the past quarter century, from 5 percent in 1976 to 15 percent in 2003. While male minority students have also seen their graduation rates rise, they have not kept pace with the women. Although both were at 5 percent in 1976, minority male rates had only gone up to 9 percent by 2003.



“Women are making gains in college participation and degree attainment, but their gains have not come at the expense of men,” says Jacqueline E. King, director of ACE’s Center for Policy Analysis and author of the study. “The number of men enrolled in college has increased, but not fast enough to narrow what is now a 57 percent female majority in total enrollment.”



A clear female majority has emerged among White students since 1995. That year, males made up 49 percent of the White undergraduate population. Their representation had dropped to 46 percent by 2003.



Male Hispanic students have experienced a very similar trend, dropping from 45 percent to 43 percent of the Hispanic undergraduate population during the same time frame. In both cases, the report cites dwindling college participation by low-income males as the cause for the overall decline. Black men, on the other hand, have seen their percentages increase over the eight-year span, going from 37 percent in 1995 to 40 percent in 2003. However, Blacks still have the most pronounced gender gap of any racial group. Asian American men held the majority in 1995, but female students have since matched their numbers, says the report. Data for American Indian undergraduates are incomplete due to low sample size.



At the graduate level, men make up 42 percent of total enrollment and are still the majority in MBA, law, master’s of science programs and in noneducation-focused doctorate programs. Women now have a slight enrollment majority in medicine (51 percent) and other health science professional programs (53 percent).



The gender gap increases among nontraditional-age undergraduate students. Women maintain a 60 percent to 62 percent majority among students 25 years old and older, the report found.



“The gender gap is important and should be addressed by educators and policy makers, but it should not obscure the larger disparities that exist by income and race/ethnicity for students of both genders,” says King. “Likewise, the fact that the rate of degree attainment has risen over time for both women and men should remind everyone concerned about male achievement that education is not a zero-sum gain in which a woman’s success results in losses for men.”



— By Shilpa Banerji

Question:
Do you have information on college enrollment?
http://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=98

Response:
Enrollment in degree-granting institutions increased by 17 percent between 1984 and 1994. Between 1994 and 2004, enrollment increased at a faster rate (21 percent), from 14.3 million to 17.3 million. Much of the growth between 1994 and 2004 was in female enrollment; the number of men enrolled rose 16 percent, while the number of women increased by 25 percent. During the same time period, part-time enrollment rose by 8 percent compared to an increase of 30 percent in full-time enrollment. In addition to the enrollment in accredited 2-year colleges, 4-year colleges, and universities, about 429,000 students attended non-degree-granting, Title IV eligible,1 postsecondary institutions in fall 2003.

The number of young students has been growing more rapidly than the number of older students, but this pattern is expected to shift. Between 1990 and 2004, the enrollment of students under age 25 increased by 31 percent. Enrollment of persons 25 and over rose by 17 percent during the same period. From 2004 to 2014, NCES projects a rise of 11 percent in enrollments of persons under 25, and an increase of 15 percent in the number 25 and over.

Enrollment trends have differed at the undergraduate, graduate, and first professional levels. Undergraduate enrollment generally increased during the 1970s, but dipped slightly between 1983 and 1985. From 1985 to 1992, undergraduate enrollment increased each year, rising 18 percent before declining slightly and stabilizing between 1993 and 1996. Undergraduate enrollment rose 20 percent between 1996 and 2004. Graduate enrollment had been steady at about 1.3 million in the late 1970s and early 1980s, but rose about 57 percent between 1985 and 2004. After rising very rapidly during the 1970s, enrollment in first professional programs stabilized in the 1980s. First-professional enrollment began rising again in the 1990s and showed an increase of 14 percent between 1994 and 2004.

Since 1984, the number of women in graduate schools has exceeded the number of men. Between 1994 and 2004, the number of male full-time graduate students increased by 25 percent, compared to 66 percent for full-time women. Among part-time graduate students, the number of men increased by 3 percent compared to a 17 percent increase for women.

The proportion of American college students who are minorities has been increasing. In 1976, some 15 percent were minorities, compared with 30 percent in 2004. Much of the change can be attributed to rising numbers of Hispanic and Asian or Pacific Islander students. The proportion of Asian or Pacific Islander students rose from 1 percent to 6 percent, and the Hispanic proportion rose from 4 percent to 10 percent during that time period. The proportion of Black students fluctuated during most of the early part of the period, before rising to 13 percent in 2004 from 9 percent in 1976. Nonresident aliens for whom race/ethnicity is not reported comprised 3 percent of the total enrollment in 2004.

1Title IV programs, which are administered by the U.S. Department of Education, provide financial aid to postsecondary students.

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics. (2006). Digest of Education Statistics, 2005 (NCES 2006-005), Chapter 3.