[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 92 (Friday, June 25, 1999)]
[House]
[Pages H4990-H4991]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




  EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM IN U.S. IS DEFICIENT IN PRODUCING SCIENTISTS AND 
                               ENGINEERS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Ehlers) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. EHLERS. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to address the Congress about a 
matter of great importance, and that is our future economic well-being.
  We are blessed with an excellent economy today, and when we ask why 
that is and look at the statistics we find out that approximately one-
third of all the economic growth today in our Nation arises from 
information technology; computers, Internet and so forth. And if we 
look at how much is caused by scientific developments in technology and 
engineering, overall it is greater than one-half of our economic 
expansion. Clearly, the economic health of our Nation depends very 
strongly upon good scientists, good engineers, good mathematicians and 
good research.

[[Page H4991]]

  The reason I rise to speak here today, my colleagues, is that there 
is a danger that we are not recognizing the importance of these issues. 
We have not funded scientific research as well as we should have the 
past half decade. We do very well with health issues in the National 
Institutes of Health, but we have not done as well with some of our 
other enterprises, such as NASA, the Department of Energy, National 
Science Foundation and other very important endeavors. But perhaps the 
greatest problem lies in the deficiencies of our educational system in 
producing scientists and engineers and educating our citizens.
  Particularly in our elementary and secondary schools, we are falling 
short not only of what we should achieve, but even more importantly we 
are falling short compared to the other nations of the world. In 
international comparisons, such as the Third International Mathematics 
and Science Study, we came in near the bottom of the developed nations 
in our high school science programs. We came in at the bottom in our 
high school physics programs. And overall we had a dismal record.
  Now, how do we address this? There are various things we must do. 
First of all, we have to find good teachers; we have to train good 
teachers; we have to recruit good teachers; and, above all, we have to 
keep good teachers.

                              {time}  1200

  When we talk about training teachers, it is not just a matter of 
training the new ones. We have to have good professional development 
programs to help teachers in the classrooms now because the science 
that should be taught today is not the science that they learned when 
they were in colleges and universities. The field changes too 
dramatically, too rapidly.
  We also need better curricula, curricula that recognize the nature 
and substance of science today and also that recognize the needs of the 
teachers in the classrooms so that they can effectively teach science.
  I am not here to cast aspersions upon any group or any individuals, I 
think we are all trying very hard. But the simple point is we are not 
succeeding, and so we have to do better.
  If we look at our graduate schools today, across our Nation in 
science and engineering we have more graduate students from other 
nations than we do from our own Nation. This tells us that our students 
competing on a level playing field in our own universities cannot make 
the grade and other nations' students are filling in.
  We have to change that. And I believe we have to change our math and 
science educational system from preschool through grad school to ensure 
three things. First of all, that we have an adequate number of good 
scientists, engineers, and mathematicians. Secondly, that our graduates 
of our schools are ready for the workplace of tomorrow. Because the 
workplace of tomorrow is going to require considerable knowledge of 
mathematics, science, and technology. Finally, we have to improve our 
educational system so that we will have better consumers and better 
voters in this Nation.
  We need better consumers because today increasingly in the 
marketplace technical information is needed and is often provided but 
many in the public are not able to interpret it, whether it relates to 
health foods, whether it relates to medicine or other areas of life.
  So I think, for those three reasons, producing better scientists and 
engineers, making our students ready for the workplace of tomorrow, and 
educating good consumers and good voters for the future, we must 
improve our math and science educational system. I am dedicating myself 
to helping the Congress and the Nation to improve our math and science 
educational programs.

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