State of the STEM Workforce

A few months ago, Amanda Stiles and I were invited to speak to a group of NASA interns, young professionals, and post-docs at the STS-127 Pre-Launch Education Forum at the Kennedy Space Center on the subject of “the State of the STEM Workforce”. We were thrilled but- why us? What did we know about the State of the STEM Workforce?

Well, not a whole lot, thought I.

Aside from our involvement in several cross-generational activities at NASA and in the commercial aerospace sector (and our employment as young professionals in the STEM industry), we definitely weren’t experts in STEM education, or its relation to the American technical workforce for that matter.

Ok, more like nothing at all, I thought, upon further reflection.

But we had the invite and we both had been feeling the mounting unease within NASA and the U.S. technical workforce at the declining status of American technological capability. Visions of national greatness slipping away and a general anxious urgency at missed opportunities tugged at my patriotic strings. We wanted to do something about it. Oh, and we’d be getting a trip to Florida out of the deal.

Oh well, we said, let’s give this a shot!

So we digged into any research we could find, put these slides together and presented at the Education Forum at KSC on June 12, 2009. Its purpose was to describe, on a very high-level, the state of the STEM workforce in the United States and how that relates to NASA, but we also wanted to motivate space people, both young and old, to be a part of strengthening American STEM capabilities by heightening awareness of the issue. It was definitely not intended to describe specific programs, projects, or solutions to NASA or the United States’ education system.

What do you think about the “state of the STEM workforce” in the U.S.? More importantly- what can we do about it?

(Our apologies on the not-so-timely posting of this presentation. Feel free to use this for other education events or send us feedback and ideas to improve it for future use.)