New Year's resolution: decide on a presidential candidate who will make education a priority, particularly STEM education.
The end of 2007 brought a terrible holiday present to the science community in the United States. Almost all research venues were handed budgets which will reduce the ability to fund primary research across the board. Living in a college town and working with many graduate students as a volunteer has made me aware of the tenuous nature of life as a professional student. Years of low pay and long hours devoted to a very small slice of the science question may lead to a poorly paid job in a grant funded project. This treatment of our STEM elite is not a good model to present to children who will inherit the responsibilities and challenges of the competitive future. My choice for president will have the following as fundamental tenets:
1. Eliminate NCLB and its 'lower the bar' mentality. Replace it with targeted support for failing schools and increased support for magnet schools in science and the arts.
2. Make research in the sciences a national priority. Innovation is our greatest asset!
3. Provide incentives for our best and brightest to become and remain teachers.
4. Reduce the burden of higher education for the middle class. Provide incentives for students selecting STEM majors.
5. Include elementary educators in efforts to integrate STEM topics into the curriculum. If the soil is not prepared, the seeds will not grow!
6. Connect an emphasis on education to solutions for Global Climate change and promoting sustainable practices.
I recommend reading Bill Richardson's white paper 'Making America's Schools Work'. If you agree with anything I've said so far, you will find many points I agree with.
One resolution done!
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