Two years ago, the CHIPS and Science Act (link goes to the full text of the bill, via the excellent congress.gov service of the Library of Congress) was signed into law. This has gotten a lot of activity going in the US related to the semiconductor industry, as briefly reviewed in this recent discussion on Marketplace. There are enormous investments by industry in semiconductor development and manufacturing in the US (as well as funding through US agencies such as DARPA, e.g.). It was recognized in the act that the long-term impact of all of this will be contingent in part upon "workforce development" - having ongoing training and education of cohorts of people who can actually support all of this. The word "workforce" shows up 222 times in the actual bill. Likewise, there is appreciation that basic research is needed to set up sustained success and competitiveness - that's one reason why the act authorizes $81B over five years for the National Science Foundation, which would have roughly doubled the NSF budget over that period.
The reality has been sharply different. Authorizations are not the same thing as appropriations, and the actual appropriation last year fell far short of the aspirational target. NSF's budget for FY24 was $9.085B (see here) compared with $9.899B for FY23; the STEM education piece was $1.172B in FY24 (compared to $1.371B in FY23), a 17% year-over-year reduction. That's even worse than the House version of the budget, which had proposed to cut the STEM education by 12.8%. In the current budget negotiations (see here), the House is now proposing an additional 14.7% cut specifically to STEM education. Just to be clear, that is the part of NSF's budget that is supposed to oversee the workforce development parts of CHIPS and Science. Specifically, the bill says that the NSF is supposed to support "undergraduate scholarships, including at community colleges, graduate fellowships and traineeships, postdoctoral awards, and, as appropriate, other awards, to address STEM workforce gaps, including for programs that recruit, retain, and advance students to a bachelor's degree in a STEM discipline concurrent with a secondary school diploma, such as through existing and new partnerships with State educational agencies." This is also the part of NSF that does things like Research Experience for Undergraduates and Research Experience for Teachers programs, and postdoctoral fellowships.
Congressional budgeting in the US is insanely complicated and fraught for many reasons. Honest, well-motivated people can have disagreements about priorities and appropriate levels of government spending. That said, I think it is foolish not to support the educational foundations needed for the large investments in high tech manufacturing and infrastructure. The people who oppose this kind of STEM education support tend to be the same people who also oppose allowing foreign talent into the country in high tech sectors. If the US is serious about this kind of investment for future tech competitiveness, half-measures and failing to follow through are decidedly not helpful.
4 comments:
In general, it looks to me like the default in STEM, for a long time now, has been to pay lots of lip service to things like DEI, education investment, etc…, and then not really back it up with meaningful action or support.
Perhaps my reading of the situation is too cynical? I’d love to be proven wrong. I know that there are lots of good people in the system who understand the importance of such efforts, but it looks to me like they are fighting a futile battle.
PS I don’t mean to offend anyone or apportion blame. I’m honestly not entirely sure what the root reason for failure of DEI/education initiatives is (or if there is even a failure). I am merely wondering what systemic problems might be the bottleneck.
Another thread that deserved notice and discussion hijacked and silenced by shifting focus to the DEI religious BS, like fart in an elevator. The US scientific community is not voiceless or powerless. Write to your representatives in each state. Individually, or collectively. University and science leadership could join forces and do the same together with industry leadership. Vote and elect the right people locally and in congress. But don't dilute and pollute the message by injecting religious delusions to placate a rabid minority. These are deadly serious and consequential issues for maintaining US science and technological leadership that require urgent action.
I don’t expect you to be satisfied with this response, but for the sake of others who might be reading:
The topic of discussion in this post was the underinvestment in science education and infrastructure, and how there is a disconnect between what politicians say (it’s important to develop the future STEM workforce) and what they do (inadequate measures and lack of financial support). I mentioned DEI because, in my opinion, it is a closely related issue of importance where there is a lot of lip service, but little action to back it up.
I did not bring up DEI with the intention of hijacking the discussion, I brought it up because I believe it is relevant to the discussion.
Also, not sure where religion came into play in my comments…
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