President Obama has just introduced a new nonprofit education initiative called Change the Equation. One hundred CEOs from major U.S. corporations are being enlisted to help improve national education in science, technology, engineering, and math, the so-called “STEM” subjects. According to the White House, the program has been allotted $5 million in funding for its first year of operation. Former astronaut Sally Ride founded the initiative. “The space program did it for my generation,” she said. “Maybe [this] will do it for the next generation.”
Change the Equation hopes to inspire students to pursue science and math, and to instill a national commitment to improving these subjects in order to ensure our economy’s success and vitality in an increasingly competitive global workforce. Over the last 25 years, the United States has slipped considerably in global rankings of math and science literacy. Corporations involved, including major players like Intel, Xerox, Time Warner Cable, and Eastman Kodak, realize that students today will soon become their workforce, and 80 percent of the jobs they’ll need will require a background in these STEM subjects.
For now, the nuts and bolts of the initiative involve expanding summer science camps for girls, allowing more students to participate in competitive robotics events, increasing teacher training, and boosting enrollment in Advanced Placement courses in math and science.
You can check it out at www.changetheequation.org.
via CNN
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