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Where Do GOP Contenders Stand on STEM?
Tweet Share on Facebook November 30, 2011 Comment (1)With the 2012 GOP race well underway, it's worth taking a look at each candidate's stances on STEM education. Many of them, such as Newt Gingrich and Rick Perry, have a long history of supporting STEM initiatives, while Ron Paul has championed home schooling, eliminating the Department of Education, and has voted against major STEM programs.
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Preview: STEMConnector Launches Tomorrow
Tweet Share on Facebook November 29, 2011 CommentHere's some exciting news for people intent on learning more about the STEM crisis: Tomorrow, U.S. News partner STEMConnector.org will official launch with tons of interesting data. Here are some of the cool things you can look forward to when the site launches tomorrow at 2 p.m. EST.
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2012 STEM Video Game Challenge Underway
Tweet Share on Facebook November 28, 2011 CommentA heads up to aspiring game designers: The 2012 National STEM Video Game Challenge is now open for entries.
The contest is open to students and game designers in four levels: middle school, high school, college and graduate students, and educators. Entrants have until March 12 to submit their ideas and games.
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Foreign-Born Earn STEM Degrees at Higher Rates than Native Citizens
Tweet Share on Facebook November 17, 2011 Comment (2)About a third of United States college graduates with engineering degrees are foreign-born, even though they account for just 16.5 percent of the U.S. population 25 and older, according to new data from the Census Bureau. Foreign-born people have about 27 percent of the degrees in computers, math, and statistics, and 24 percent of degrees in physical science.
An expert from Georgetown University's Center for Education and the Workforce told U.S. News reporter Danielle Kurtzleben that some of the gap comes from people born in countries that value STEM skills, such as China and India. Read her article to learn more about the study.
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Space Pioneer: Humans Could Leave Earth ‘Irreversibly’ in Coming Decades
Tweet Share on Facebook November 16, 2011 Comment (1)In the early 1990s, Peter Diamandis decided he wanted to experience weightlessness—unfortunately, the only zero gravity flights at the time were with NASA. He decided to create his own.
"I spent many weeks and months trying to get on a zero-G airplane," he says. "Finally, I said, 'Forget it. I'm going to start it myself.'"
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'Average Is Officially Over'
Tweet Share on Facebook November 16, 2011 Comment (9)New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman and National Center of Education and the Economy President Marc Tucker painted a bleak picture of America's future at a promotional event in Washington, D.C., yesterday.
"Average is officially over," declared Friedman, who was promoting his new book That Used to Be Us: How America Fell Behind in the World It Invented and How We Can Come Back.
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Experts Brief Congress on New AP Curricula
Tweet Share on Facebook November 16, 2011 CommentNext year, instructors of Advanced Placement biology courses will teach an entirely new curriculum—one that emphasizes deeper thought and experimentation, not memorization of facts.
"What I'm [seeing] from teachers as they get ready to teach this course is widespread fear," Trevor Packer, vice president of Advanced Placement at the College Board, which develops the courses, told a subcommittee of Congress Monday.
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Duncan: Countries That Out-educate Us Will Out-compete Us
Tweet Share on Facebook November 10, 2011 Comment (3)Secretary of Education Arne Duncan told a crowd of 700 teachers from 70 countries in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday that countries must work together to share best education practices.
People need to "resist the idea that international competition in education is somehow a zero sum game in which one nation's advance is another nation's loss," he said. "It is true that global job markets are much more competitive today than even a generation ago. But today's knowledge-based economy compels educators and nations to become both more competitive and more collaborative at the same time."
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National Academy of Science Awards Grant to Game Design Group
Tweet Share on Facebook November 8, 2011 CommentThe National Academy of Sciences has awarded a Los Angeles-based organization $225,000 to develop science-based games for the classroom that the group hopes will become the "textbooks of the future."
GameDesk Institute, a nonprofit made up of University of Southern California researchers, might just be up to the task—the group recently announced a partnership to create games with Bill Nye the Science Guy, already has an impressive slate of educational games, and has a California charter school in the works.
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Best STEM Scholarships
Tweet Share on Facebook November 3, 2011 CommentThis morning, Mackenzie Owens of Scholarship America featured some of the best college scholarships available for high school students.
There are a variety of scholarships available for students pursuing a career in the STEM fields, including the Obama Teaching Scholarships and the Davidson Institute Fellowship Program.
