{"id":9583,"date":"2010-10-15T15:32:02","date_gmt":"2010-10-15T19:32:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/engineering.jhu.edu\/magazine-archive\/?p=9583"},"modified":"2017-07-31T15:44:09","modified_gmt":"2017-07-31T19:44:09","slug":"stemming-brain-drain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/engineering.jhu.edu\/magazine-archive\/2010\/10\/stemming-brain-drain\/","title":{"rendered":"STEMming the Brain Drain"},"content":{"rendered":"\"STEM\"<\/a>\n

Related Story:<\/strong>
\n\u00bb STEM Initiatives at the Whiting School<\/a><\/p>\n

Marc Donohue fears that an engineering brain drain will cripple the United States and ultimately trigger a global cataclysm.<\/p>\n

His case begins innocuously enough with the hypothetical tale of a homeowner who has no clue how to prevent the basement pipes from freezing or fix a sump pump. But Donohue, vice dean for research for the Whiting School of Engineering, quickly raises the threat level, depicting a nation incapable of developing renewable energy methods or solving water shortages. From there, Donohue\u2019s narrative hurtles into a world at war over the planet\u2019s scant remaining natural resources.<\/p>\n

Donohue places much of the blame for his doomsday scenario on the complexities of the digital universe. \u201cAdvanced technology has led us down this path where we have become complacent about all the technology in our lives,\u201d he says. \u201cWe can\u2019t understand any of it; that\u2019s a problem.\u201d<\/p>\n

To varying degrees, researchers, educators, and policymakers across the country share Donohue\u2019s distress. They, too, are pushing to make education reform in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) a national priority. Contending that the country\u2019s future depends on reversing these trends, they cite stark evidence of declining student performance in the STEM disciplines.<\/p>\n

Last year, for example, a special analysis by the\u00a0National Center for Education Statistics<\/a>\u00a0found that in 2006, 15-year-old students in the United States placed in the bottom third of 30 developed nations in a science literacy assessment. Their average score was 489, compared to top-performing Finland\u2019s average score of 563. Canada and Japan rounded out the trio of countries with the highest scores.<\/p>\n

In the same assessment, the average mathematics literacy score for 15-year-old students in the United States was a lackluster 474, placing the country in the bottom quarter of all 30 participating nations, and again well below the top three: Finland, Korea, and Japan.<\/p>\n

STEM performance in the United States is stagnant at best. Some more encouraging statistics show an uptick in science and engineering degrees at the undergraduate and graduate levels, but they must also be interpreted with caution, says Allen Soyster, director of the Division of Engineering Education and Centers at the National Science Foundation (NSF) while on leave from his post as dean of Northeastern University\u2019s School of Engineering.<\/p>\n

Many engineers, both newly minted and experienced, are gravitating to jobs outside of their academic field, lured by handsome salary offers, Soyster explains. \u201cIf you take all the students who graduated in engineering in 2006, what percent are working in areas closely related to their degree? Fifty-seven percent. So 43 percent of graduates who have completed an engineering degree after four years are not working in a closely related area.\u201d<\/p>\n

Every mutiny makes it more difficult for the country to reclaim its economic super powers. Another impediment is the accelerating rate of engineers nearing retirement age (26 percent were older than age 50 in 2006, according to NSF figures), which has slowed the steady growth of engineers in the workforce.<\/p>\n

“I think it’s important for girls to understand that upper-level math and science courses keep many doors open to them in career options.”<\/p>\n

– Mary Zappone, BS ’86, President of Alcoa Oil & Gas<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In response to these worrisome trends, Whiting School faculty and others with Johns Hopkins University affiliations are championing fresh approaches to the STEM crisis. From their respective positions as leaders in education, industry, and public policy, each sees the situation through a customized lens.<\/p>\n

Some, like Donohue, view sagging STEM achievement as a threat to the nation\u2019s global dominance. \u201cWe may be on an irreversible path,\u201d he says. \u201cChina is graduating five times as many engineers per year.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"STEM\"<\/a>Others regard the problem through the eyes of disadvantaged eighth-grade students in a classroom with no microscopes or lab materials. \u201cTo be competitive, I believe in the long run that we need to be equitable,\u201d says Paul Kadri \u201987, superintendent of Groton, CT, public schools.<\/p>\n

The president of Emory University, James Wagner, MA \u201978 (Med), PhD \u201984, takes the long view, referring to antiquity, when arithmetic, astronomy, and geometry were required courses for men free to pursue a life of the mind. \u201cFor centuries we have understood that someone who received a liberal education would have received it with a heavy, heavy dose of science,\u201d says Wagner, a former Whiting School faculty member.<\/p>\n

Anxious STEM stakeholders have a more recent historical touchstone in Sputnik. In the 1950s and early 1960s, the Russian satellite program prompted a similar scramble in the United States to improve math and science education. For Americans at the time, winning the space race symbolized triumph over the Soviet Union.<\/p>\n

Now another technological defeat looms. But this time around, the American public has lost that sense of urgency, says Soyster. \u201cI went to engineering school in the 1960s as part of the Sputnik group,\u201d he says. \u201cBecoming an engineer was a big deal. There was national focus on the field. Now, that issue doesn\u2019t seem to exist so much in the public mind.\u201d<\/p>\n

As the Cold War began to wind down in 1985, engineering degrees in the United States peaked at about 80,000 before a precipitous decline. Meanwhile, the former Soviet Union has been replaced as a threat to American security by G-8 competitors and emerging nations awash with innovation and an increasingly capable workforce. Internationally, competition for young people with a science or engineering background is growing progressively fierce.<\/p>\n

A range of concerned organizations has issued reports on the topic, including the influential\u00a0Rising Above the Gathering Storm: Energizing and Employing America for a Brighter Economic Future<\/a><\/em>. Published in 2007 by National Academies Press, the 564-page account raised the specter of Sputnik as it outlined the mounting economic risk posed by an American citizenry ill-prepared for the STEM workforce of the future.<\/p>\n

Instead of a single, nuclear menace, though, the Gathering Storm report warns that the \u201cinadequacies of our system of research and education pose a greater threat to U.S. national security over the next quarter century than any potential conventional war that we might imagine.\u201d<\/p>\n

Without well-paying jobs and ample sources of clean and affordable energy, the United States will not be able to compete against emerging nations such as China and India, where a low wage workforce and hightech ingenuity fuel booming economies, the report cautions. Its authors argue that the nation\u2019s economic supremacy depends on a massive and costly effort to increase the quantity and quality of science and mathematics teachers in grades K-12\u2014 necessary for enlarging the pipeline of students prepared to pursue STEM degrees in college.<\/p>\n

Policymakers took the report seriously. Congress adopted some of the recommendations in the America Creating Opportunities to Meaningfully Promote Excellence in Technology, Education, and Science Act, or the\u00a0America COMPETES Act<\/a>, passed in 2007. Private foundations and companies came through with incentives and funding for the National Math and Science Initiative.<\/p>\n

But in 2009, a follow-up to the Gathering Storm found little progress in STEM achievement, noting that the America COMPETES Act had not received the funding necessary to realize the report\u2019s suggestions.<\/p>\n

This indifferent response to the Gathering Storm compounded a nagging dilemma. Companies in the United States had become reliant on temporary foreign workers to fill the need for technological expertise. Critics viewed this practice as a troubling stopgap. Yet, when fewer engineers and scientists were allowed into the country after 9\/11 for security reasons, the nation\u2019s defense contractors were caught short again.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you\u2019re comfortable with the fact that a large part of our technical talent comes from overseas, then there\u2019s no problem, that talent is excellent, it helps us,\u201d says Michigan State University professor Percy Pierre, PhD \u201967. \u201cIf you\u2019re comfortable with the fact that many high-paying jobs that Americans might aspire to are not being achieved by Americans, then there\u2019s no problem.\u201d Pierre hastens to add: \u201cThe problem is not with the foreign workers, the problem is with us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last year, President Barack Obama marveled at the reverence for learning he observed on recent visits to Korea and China. \u201cThat used to be what we were about,\u201d he said during the launch of a\u00a0national campaign to boost student achievement in STEM fields<\/a>. \u201cThat\u2019s what we\u2019re going to be about again.\u201d<\/p>\n

Obama went on to advocate the truly \u201cliberal education\u201d prized by Wagner. Raising the quality of STEM education is also \u201cabout an informed citizenry in an era where many of the problems we face as a nation are, at root, scientific problems,\u201d the president said. \u201cAnd it\u2019s about the power of science to not only unlock new discoveries, but to unlock in the minds of our young people a sense of promise, a sense that with some hard work\u2014with effort\u2014they have the potential to achieve extraordinary things.\u201d<\/p>\n

But translating the president\u2019s vision into an educational framework to address the STEM crisis is a formidable challenge. The process doesn\u2019t begin by issuing ominous warnings about economic and security risks, Wagner says. It begins by placing a premium on the value of learning for the sake of learning across all disciplines. When the sciences are restored to the liberal arts canon, national fortitude will follow, Wagner contends. That\u2019s why he finds the recent trend among universities to split apart colleges of arts and sciences so discouraging. \u201cWhat message does this send about the completeness of education when we no longer say we are going to teach the arts and the sciences?\u201d Wagner says.<\/p>\n

The same faulty reasoning can be found in a popular culture that has produced what Wagner dubs the \u201cNewtonian Physics for Dummies\u201d school of thought. The \u201cdummy\u201d distinction automatically distances untold consumers of such books from the country\u2019s STEM brain trust, he says. \u201cThe notion that folks who have interests in areas outside of the sciences need to understand some sort of science at their level serves us poorly,\u201d Wagner says. \u201cThe implicit message is that you actually are a dummy and we don\u2019t expect you to understand or to ever contribute to that body of knowledge.\u201d<\/p>\n

All citizens deserve access to \u201cthe knowledge base that makes us human,\u201d Wagner says. \u201cBy extension, if we are failing to fully educate people, or if we\u2019re defining a full education with only a partial deck, we are handicapping American competitiveness and demand in the STEM fields. Narrowing the dimensionality of American society puts the United States at a disadvantage.\u201d<\/p>\n

If Wagner is the philosopher king of STEM, K-12 educators are the ground soldiers, attempting to realize his democratic vision within financially strapped school systems serving students from an unprecedented range of cultures and income levels.<\/p>\n

Revamp STEM education in the name of American democracy, not geopolitical jitters, says Kadri, who oversees a school system with a vibrant mix of students. In the United States, education is first and foremost a right, not a calculated strategy for global survival, he maintains.<\/p>\n

Assessments show that K-12 students are not learning the basic concepts that underpin geology or biology, for example. Just as lacking in the classroom, Kadri and others say, is a spirit of inquiry that spurs students to hands-on exploration to find answers that stress creative thinking rather than rote memory.<\/p>\n

Beginning in elementary school, the most important thing is how students think and how they solve problems; not just solve them to be right but to be correct and to see the creative possibilities and implications presented by their solution, Kadri says. \u201cIf we can get students to do that, they\u2019re probably well prepared for a future that we can only imagine.\u201d<\/p>\n

Under Kadri\u2019s stewardship, Groton\u2019s students are using hands-on science kits to learn about Earth, wind, and space. \u201cYou no longer need the traditional model of the teacher being the door through which knowledge exists,\u201d he says. \u201cThe teacher is a facilitator who helps students sift through knowledge, organize it, present it, and be able to develop tools for understanding important principles and distinguishing what\u2019s real and what\u2019s not real.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Another hot button among STEM education advocates is the number of K-12 teachers who are either uncertified or unqualified in their field. In 2004, only 40 percent of fifth-grade students were taught mathematics and science by teachers with either a degree or certificate in their teaching field, according to NSF figures.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we create really elite experiences for the best prepared students, that will not get us back on track. All children should be considered as part of the STEM pipeline. You can\u2019t [just] pay attention to one end or another.\u201d<\/p>\n

– David Andrews, Dean, Johns Hopkins School of Education<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"STEM\"<\/a>The current emphasis on testing can interrupt students\u2019 path to STEM distinction, Kadri says. Although an ardent champion of equal education opportunities, he still grapples with the impact of state and federally required assessments on the system\u2019s most gifted students. \u201cThe emphasis with these tests is to bring the students at the bottom to an adequate level, instead of pushing everybody to the maximum level,\u201d he says. \u201cAs it relates to our top students, are we also giving them opportunities, such as online learning and so forth, to advance?\u201d<\/p>\n

David Andrews, new dean of Hopkins\u2019 School of Education, believes a top-notch STEM education should be available for students at every intellectual tier. As a professor at Ohio State University, Andrews helped to open a STEM-based public high school designed as a laboratory for innovative teaching practices. Operating in partnership with a local high-tech firm and other educators, Metro High School, in Columbus, Ohio, stresses a multidisciplinary approach to STEM and requires seniors to work off-campus with engineers and scientists, often for college credit.<\/p>\n

Working together, Metro\u2019s faculty upends traditional approaches to STEM pedagogy, for example, offering physics rather than the usual chemistry course to first-year students. \u201cIf you teach physics to freshmen, the concepts are easier to grasp and can prepare students for the rigors of chemistry and working in a wet lab,\u201d Andrews says.<\/p>\n

Metro High School\u2019s model has been replicated in five districts across Ohio, creating a statewide platform for rejuvenating STEM education. This year, Metro\u2019s first class of 400 students graduated, and nearly all will attend college or a technical training program, Andrews says.<\/p>\n

Seismic shifts in technology and demography demand an egalitarian approach, Andrews says. By ninth grade, though, subpar achievement in math has already knocked too many students out of the running for the workforce of the future.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think everybody fully understands the pipeline issue,\u201d Andrews says. \u201cIf we create really elite experiences for the best prepared students, that will not get us back on track. All children should be considered as part of the STEM pipeline,\u201d Andrews says. \u201cYou can\u2019t [just] pay attention to one end or another.\u201d<\/p>\n

As students made their way through Metro, the top kids did well and the struggling kids continued to struggle. But with a lot of support, they got through, too, Andrews says. \u201cWe really have to figure out as a country how to continue to move everyone toward a post-secondary experience that matches their needs.\u201d<\/p>\n

From her vantage point in industry as president of Alcoa Oil & Gas, Mary Zappone \u201986 is particularly interested in supporting and mentoring young women to pursue careers in math and science. Though women currently constitute some 46 percent of the U.S. workforce, they hold just 26 percent of U.S. jobs in science, technology, and engineering. Fewer than 10 percent of American engineers are women. \u201cHelping young women become excited about math and science and the numerous ways they can use that education is important to ensure the next generation of leaders includes diverse viewpoints,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s important for [girls] to understand that upper-level math and science courses keep many doors open to them in career options,\u201d says Zappone, who earned her BS in chemical engineering at the Whiting School and an MBA from Columbia University. \u201cConversely, choices to not take algebra and then other \u2018tougher\u2019 math courses can lead to shutting down upper-level courses\u2014and therefore certain careers.\u201d Because decisions about courses are made \u201cby 13- and 14-year-old kids, who do not understand the potential implications,\u201d she says, \u201cI think a push to drive \u2018keeping your options open\u2019 for teenagers, particularly girls, makes a difference.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite the demands of her career, Zappone stays active in her role as mentor. In 2010, she was one of the leading female executives from Fortune 500 companies who took part in the\u00a0National Math + Science Young Leaders Program<\/a>, aimed at encouraging college women to continue their studies in STEM subjects and pursue careers in STEM fields. At Hopkins, she serves on the career mentoring committeeof the Society of Engineering Alumni.<\/p>\n

Zappone believes strongly that solving the STEM crisis will take a village. \u201cEveryone must participate,\u201d she says. \u201cWe need to best align government, parents, educators, and even corporations to ensure that appropriate talent is available for the jobs of the future.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

For inquiry, creative work, and scientific debate to become the bedrock of STEM education, the teaching mindset as well as the curricula must progress, Donohue says. \u201cOne of the challenges we have in the education system is that we teach kids that there is a right answer to everything. With real world problems, there is often more than one right answer. We have to get the teachers beyond that mentality.\u201d<\/p>\n

What\u2019s more, Donohue contends, few K-12 students are receiving a \u201csilo free\u201d science education at a time when technological breakthroughs frequently arrive by way of transdisciplinary investigations that blur those traditional STEM boundaries beyond recognition.<\/p>\n

And because technology has become so complex, traditional classroom lessons in math and science are useless without linking them to the core ideas that drive technological change, Donohue says.<\/p>\n

Rather than start with equations and theories, it makes more sense to capture students\u2019 attention through their fascination with high-tech gadgetry, he says. Why not begin with a discussion of how researchers developed iPods or cell phones based on core engineering principles? Donohue says, \u201cWe have to start teaching the technology and hope that kids will want to learn the math and science.\u201d<\/p>\n

As budget shortfalls and poor teacher preparation prove intractable, it\u2019s up to practitioners in particular to upgrade STEM education in both affluent and disadvantaged jurisdictions, Pierre says. \u201cI don\u2019t see existing K-12 programs putting sufficient priority on science and engineering,\u201d he says. \u201cThe engineering profession needs to reach down to those levels and try to make a difference in the lives of those students.\u201d<\/p>\n

Many engineering schools already offer summer STEM programs for students and teachers, but within academia as well, \u201cthere is a need for more,\u201d Pierre says. \u201cIf we were not doing what we were doing, the problem would be even worse.\u201d<\/p>\n

Forced by the economic downturn to make painful budget cuts, Whiting School dean Nicholas Jones nevertheless arrived at a similar conclusion. \u201cI pretty much decided that STEM education outreach is a core mission,\u201d he says. \u201cIf every engineering school doesn\u2019t reach out and make an effort, I think that we are going to be in big trouble.\u201d<\/p>\n

The dean\u2019s resolve helped to preserve\u00a0Engineering Innovation<\/a>, a stimulating summer outreach program offered by the Whiting School at nine sites around the country. The course introduces talented high school students from all economic backgrounds to problem solving and design challenges that require an integrated STEM approach.<\/p>\n

Determined to expand the Whiting School\u2019s efforts and attract corporate sponsors, Jones hired Christine Newman as assistant dean for educational outreach.<\/p>\n

Jones also made the strategic decision to focus outreach efforts on better preparation for STEM teachers. \u201cThere are a limited number of kids we can touch,\u201d he says \u201cBut year after year, teachers can really reach out to more kids than we can.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Whiting School, through its Engineering for Professionals program, will offer STEM teachers in Baltimore the opportunity to take courses at no cost. After piloting the program in two local jurisdictions, \u201cwe will basically expand it to the entire state,\u201d Jones says. Eventually, in collaboration with Johns Hopkins School of Education, he hopes to package four of those advanced classes with a capstone course for a STEM certificate.<\/p>\n

For Donohue, the STEM crisis boils down to the national ramifications of a rapidly expanding service economy. As lucrative manufacturing jobs give way to minimum wage jobs in food prep, retail sales, and similar occupations, prospects are bleak for national prosperity, he says. \u201cWe cannot have the service sector growing and growing and not producing anything,\u201d Donohue says. \u201cIt just doesn\u2019t work. The society as a whole has got to create something of value.\u201d<\/p>\n

What will it take for the public to avert the impending economic calamity?<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you look at the current crop of people 18 to 30 years old, they are the first generation whose standard of living will be less than their parents\u2019,\u201d Donohue says. \u201cIn all of history, with every succeeding generation, except for wartime, there was the hope and the expectation that your children\u2019s lives would be better than yours. \u201c<\/p>\n

That\u2019s not true for my kids. I think if there\u2019s an issue out there that might get people\u2019s attention, that might be it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Against a dismal backdrop, our experts champion fresh ideas for making STEM–science, technology, engineering, and mathematics–a national priority. The country’s future depends on it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9583","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-features","issue-fall-2010"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nSTEMming the Brain Drain - JHU Engineering Magazine<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/engineering.jhu.edu\/magazine-archive\/2010\/10\/stemming-brain-drain\/\" \/>\n<link rel=\"next\" href=\"https:\/\/engineering.jhu.edu\/magazine-archive\/2010\/10\/stemming-brain-drain\/2\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"STEMming the Brain Drain - JHU Engineering Magazine\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Against a dismal backdrop, our experts champion fresh ideas for making STEM--science, technology, engineering, and mathematics--a national priority. 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