This week of science festivals around the nation has mostly been a very festive occasion, indeed (I, for example, learned at a “science cabaret” last night that Linneaus was obsessed with bananas). It has also brought forth welcome coverage of equity issues in STEM fields: the perpetually low numbers of women, minorities, and persons [...]
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February 17th, 2012 Close your eyes and imagine a biology department or engineering school where every single one of the following policy changes has been implemented: ….universities might educate women graduate students about the downsides of alternative career paths, following partners’ career moves and taking time off. They could explore the use of part-time tenure-track positions for women [...] January 25th, 2012 In his State of the Union address last night, President Obama took another step in his effort to rebrand community colleges. He sees the nation’s two-year colleges as playing a big role in preparing those who will work in emerging high-tech manufacturing industries. Putting worries about his job-creation strategy aside for a minute (I’ll believe [...] December 10th, 2011 Reading reports about the Bayer Corporation’s new survey of STEM department chairs at U.S. research universities leads to a fairly discouraging take-away. In asking the 413 chairs for their thoughts on why so many women and under-represented minority students fail to complete STEM degree programs, the survey uncovered two beliefs that have left me less than [...] August 1st, 2011 Is it safe to assume that when CNN reports on a presidential economic or educational initiative that’s been around for awhile, there’s some serious White House PR effort under way? A “CNNMoney” column today titled “Recovery at Risk: Community Colleges Step in to Fill ‘Skills Gap’” by Tami Luhby lays out the basics of [...] July 16th, 2011 Teeth pretty much gritted, I’m collecting uses of the word “innovation” in discussions of America’s current economic malaise, convinced that the promotion of high-tech invention has become the smiley face of the new millennium: A jolly and superficial exhortation (“If only we innovate, things will be better!”), that has started to function as [...] June 23rd, 2011 The idea that 4-year college degrees and liberal arts curricula waste students’ time and money, which I’ve lately been writing about in this blog, is definitely spreading among those who seem most easily to get media exposure. The recent words of Bill Gross, one of the country’s most revered bond investors, have been heard across [...] June 14th, 2011 I’ve been watching the spread of a troubling recessionary idea: That sending fewer Americans to college will solve our economic problems. In STEM fields, this is part of the whole “skills gap” story so popular in talk about education-for-jobs today…the notion that in order for the nation to thrive, we need more people who prepare [...] February 9th, 2011 Interesting: A paper published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences by Cornell researchers Stephen J. Ceci and Wendy M. Williams has gained a great deal of media attention, as these things go. Reading the coverage, I’d say we’re definitely a culture split between those who want to put gender bias behind [...] January 25th, 2011 If President Obama was an ordinary orator, I’d be placing bets on the number of times “innovation,” “education” and just plain “technology” will come up in the State of the Union tonight…with side-bets on “future” and “tomorrow.” But as an eloquent stylist, he’ll likely avoid the sort of redundancy that makes for good speech-based gambling fun. (Or, [...] |
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