[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 147 (2001), Part 11]
[House]
[Pages 14979-14980]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



  Mr. HALL of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, 
and I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. EHLERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

                             {time}   1545

  I certainly appreciate all the expressions of support for this bill. 
As my colleagues may know, this bill and the previous one are a product 
of a number of years of work.
  But let me reemphasize a few points. For those who think that we are 
already doing a sufficiently good job on K-12 math and science, I 
encourage a visit to graduate schools in this Nation. In virtually 
every graduate school in science and engineering, we find that over 
half of the students are from other nations. Our students cannot 
compete against students from other nations in applying for admission 
to graduate school.
  If more evidence is needed, just look at the actions of this Congress 
itself. This year we have approved 200,000 H-1B visas. Why? Because we 
do not have enough scientists, engineers, technicians, and 
mathematicians in this country to do the work that we need done to 
invent, develop, and produce the products that we are making in this 
country.
  I could give other reasons why we have problems here. Let us face it, 
some of the problems are cultural. That is why the gentlewoman from 
California (Ms. Woolsey) introduced her bill trying to encourage young 
girls to go into science, technology, and engineering because there is 
a culture in this country that women cannot do math or women cannot do 
science. It is utter nonsense. We are throwing away approximately 40 
percent of our potential scientific, engineering, and mathematics 
workforce with that cultural attitude, that women are not good at 
science or math or that minorities do not care for science or math. 
That is nonsense, because in other countries they do; and they become 
scientists, engineers, doctors, and mathematicians. Women and 
minorities in this country can do the same.
  We have to work hard to change that culture, and this bill will move 
us in that direction.
  Science is fun if it is understood. Science is exciting when taught 
properly. And we have to make certain that

[[Page 14980]]

the students of America enjoy that experience and realize that science 
is fun.
  But the cultural issue is still an important one. As a physicist I 
have often had the experience when I met someone, before I came to the 
Congress, and they would ask what I do. I would say I am a physicist, 
and quite often I would get the response, ``Oh, I could never 
understand all those numbers and symbols; I just could not get math or 
science.'' For a number of years, I accepted that statement. But then I 
began to think that was strange. What if I had asked them the question 
first, what do you do, and they said, ``Well, I am an English 
teacher,'' and I said, ``Oh, I cannot understand all those letters and 
words, and so I gave up reading.'' That is socially unacceptable. But 
by the same standard, it should also be socially unacceptable to 
publicly profess ignorance of science and math.
  Everyone is capable of learning some science and math. Everyone 
should learn it. I think it is extremely important in today's society 
that people not only understand the writings of Shakespeare and read 
them, but they should also understand the third law of dynamics; not as 
a physicist does, I do not expect that, but they should certainly 
understand what the three laws of thermodynamics mean and why we have 
an energy crisis today because we have, as a public, failed to 
understand the implications of the three laws of thermodynamics. 
Concepts such as this are important, and people should be aware of them 
and understand the implications of them.
  These are all purposes of this bill and also of the bill of the 
gentleman from New York (Mr. Boehlert). I am hopeful that these bills 
will pass into law and that together they will go far to improve the 
competence of the scientists, engineers, mathematicians, and the lay 
people of this country so that we will no longer have a shortage of 
people to work in the technical, scientific industries, that we will 
train good teachers, and that we will have schools and students that we 
can be very proud of.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Miller of Florida). The question is on 
the motion offered by the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Ehlers) that the 
House suspend the rules and pass the bill, H.R. 100, as amended.
  The question was taken; and (two-thirds having voted in favor 
thereof) the rules were suspended and the bill, as amended, was passed.
  A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.

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