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ATTRACTING A NEW GENERATION TO MATH AND SCIENCE: THE ROLE OF PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS IN EDUCATION AND H.R. 1265, THE MATHEMATICS AND SCIENCE PROFICIENCY PARTNERSHIP ACT
THURSDAY, JULY 29, 1999
House of Representatives,
Committee on Science,
Subcommittee on Basic Research,
Washington, DC.
The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, in room 2318, Rayburn House Office Building, at 10:17 a.m., the Hon. Nick Smith (Chairman of the Subcommittee) presiding.
Chairman SMITH. The Subcommittee will come to order. Good morning.
Today's hearing is focused on encouraging more students from every socioeconomic level to study math and science and to embark on careers in technical fields. I think this is an important goal, as our nation's future success will rest on our ability to compete in a global economy that is increasingly technologically driven.
Today's students will be tomorrow's workforce, whether scientists or machinists, educators or executives, lawyers or farmers, they will need to be well versed in math and science to compete successfully.
Those in the private sector know just how important education is to their companies' and, of course, America's future. As a result, many companies are focusing attention and money on improving our educational efforts in math and science. This is more than just good corporate politics, it is interesting to note, as the survival of these companies will increasingly depend on a skilled and educated workforce.
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In some cases, this has involved organized efforts involving many companies, such as the Business Roundtable. This is an association of CEOs from many of the nation's largest corporations.
In other cases, individual companies, such as Texas Instruments and Lockheed Martin, who are represented here with us today, but there are also many others and they have reached out into the local community to influence and support educational efforts.
In Michigan, for example, a consortium of companies, including Chrysler, Ford, General Motors, many others, have been working hand-in-hand with educational institutions and non-profit groups to improve math and science education.
We know that most of our current math and science education programs are not doing as well as they should for our students. The results of the Third International Math and Science Study were both, I think, clear and compelling. Compared to their counterparts in the rest of the developed world, American students are at or near the bottom when it comes to high school achievement in math and science.
That even in the cream of crop of American students, that even in what we consider the best schools and the best students, they are not on a par with the top level students in other countries, I think, is an indication that our current system is failing all of our students and, to an extent, failing our future.
We must strengthen math and science education in every part of the country and every level. To do so, we ought to be constantly gathering data on a wide variety of reforms currently in practice to find out what works and what doesn't, and then share this knowledge with every state and every school district.
As with any important initiative, it makes sense to build on programs that are working. I agree with Edward Russ, the Chairman and CEO of the State Farm Insurance and the Chairman of the Business Roundtable's Education Task Force, who suggested, in testimony earlier this month before the House Education Workforce Committee, that we ought to focus Federal funds on achieving results, not simply continue putting money in and sustaining programs. In fact, Director Colwell has assured me that NSF is proceeding with an evaluation of the systemic initiatives program and that furthermore, the evaluation will be expanded to include an increase into the effectiveness of private sector involvement in improving math and science.
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There's a lot of success stories out there and we need to make sure we know what they are, where they are, and start applying what works across the board throughout this country.
I support the goal of encouraging more students to go into math and science and information technology careers and raising the level of math and science literacy with every high school graduate.
The involvement of industry in achieving this objectives is welcome. The question, of course, is what exact course should be taken. The bill proposed by my colleague, Ms. Johnson of Texas, takes one approach and I compliment her for her efforts in this area because it is so important that we continue to discuss, debate and move ahead in this area.
By learning about the diversity of programs that currently exist, we may get additional ideas. I look forward to hearing the testimony of the witnesses on this important subject.
Before I turn this over to the Ranking Minority Member, the gentlewoman from Texas, I would just like to remind everyone that today's hearing is on our Webcast and, Eddie Bernice, maybe brief comments on your bill and your other comments.
Ms. JOHNSON. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. To paraphrase a great American, the title of this hearing reads like a thousand-page novel. It is both compelling and difficult to put down. Chairman Smith, I am very grateful to you for having this hearing and also to our Full Committee chairman, Mr. Sensenbrenner, for scheduling it.
To date, this Subcommittee has addressed Antarctica, earthquakes, and the importance of fire safety. I'm very pleased the majority and minority members of this committee have come together to focus on the role of public-private partnerships in education, as well as on my legislation, the Mathematics and Science Proficiency Partnership Act, the H.R. 1265, that seeks to offer focus and to galvanize public-private partnerships.
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Is there a need for these partnerships between schools from kindergarten through the 12th grade and businesses? I think it has to be. Compared to their international peers, American 12th grade students tested near the bottom of the Third International Mathematics and Science Study that was released last year.
Our U.S. high school seniors ranked 16th in their knowledge of science and 19th in their knowledge of mathematics among the 21 competing countries. One chief executive officer of the U.S. information technology company who testified before the Science Committee earlier this year outlined this problem graphically.
In speaking of a job opening at his company, he expressed his frustrations about not receiving a single qualified applicant from our country in over 300 resumes. That job went to a foreign applicant.
Providing more H–1B visas to allow foreign-born workers to immigrate here to fill high technology jobs is no more than a stopgate measure to address this problem. One in ten positions in information technology and its related fields is currently unfilled, according to the Information Technology Association of America.
We need to develop our own homegrown talent. My state of Texas has hired more people in this area than any other place in the country, is secondly to California as the nation's leader in high technology and information-based jobs.
Improved school and business partnerships, in my view, will preserve these gains and encourage new growth in other regions. My legislation will help to address declining test scores, workplace readiness, and U.S. competitiveness.
H.R. 1265 is a targeted measure. It seeks to bring schools and businesses together in a very limited, but focused way to advance the national interest through math and science education. The components of this partnership will include support for teacher training, educational materials, equipment, as well as the establishment of college scholarships for promising students on job site internships.
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My bill authorizes the National Science Foundation to award ten partnership grants through its rural and urban systemic program. The National Science Foundation Director will make five grants to urban areas and five grants to rural areas. Each grant will not exceed $300,000 and the total amount that this legislation authorizes is $3 million.
It is clear that this is not an answer to all, but it does give us some kind of benchmark as to what will work. Eligibility of the partnership grants will be based on how well the schools and businesses have forged their alliances as developed by the National Science Foundation.
Ways that businesses can participate include setting up college scholarships for promising math and science students, establishing job site mentoring and internship programs and donating computer software, as well as hardware, to participating schools.
Ways that schools participate include securing innovative training for their math and science teachers, as well as focusing their students to workplace opportunities. The legislation directs the National Science Foundation Director to conduct a long-range study on the students who have participated in the partnership scholarship program and their ability to land and retain jobs in the field of math, science, and information technology.
H.R. 1265 has 85 co-sponsors and is truly a piece of bipartisan legislation. It has the support of the National Science Teachers Association, American Airlines, Exxon Education Foundation, TUX, formerly Texas Utilities, American Chemical Society, and the Institute for Fusion Studies at the University of Texas, and others.
With your permission, Mr. Chairman, I would like to introduce into the record letters of support from these businesses and organizations. I appreciate your recommendation to add a rural component earlier when we discussed that is reflected in this bill.
Chairman SMITH. Without objection, that's so ordered.
Ms. JOHNSON. Thank you. I'm grateful to your efforts to secure hearing on math and science education partnerships. We've been listening now for over two years.
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I look forward to working with you and all members of the committee to move this bill or something that will get at addressing this problem. I want to thank our witnesses for being here and I look forward to hearing from them.
This bill is not put forth to be perfect, but it is put forth to be a beginning. If we don't get started, we'll get 20 years more behind.
I started working on minorities and women coming into these fields over 20 years ago while I was in the State House in Texas. We are still almost in the same place now as we were then. We need to do something, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.
Chairman SMITH. Thank you. Normally, we offer the opportunity for other members of the committee to submit any opening statements in writing and that certainly will be open for the next five days.
The gentleman from New York, Mr. Boehlert, has demonstrated leadership in this area and if any of the other members of the Subcommittee would like to make a statement, I would ask that they try to accomplish that in two minutes, so we can hear our witnesses. But, Mr. Boehlert, your leadership is recognized.
Mr. BOEHLERT. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I think it is very appropriate that we have this hearing on this subject in this room on this day.
We have just returned from California, the funeral services for our very distinguished former colleague, the former chairman of this committee, George Brown. No subject was of greater interest to him than the subject we are talking about today.
I don't think we're nearly bold enough, I don't think our vision is nearly broad enough. Is there a need to attract the next generation to science and math? You bet there is. Are we doing enough? The answer is clearly hell no. We're not doing nearly enough in government or the private sector.
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I'm a little bit tired of the private sector constantly complaining about the need for students to have greater skills, and yet I find the private sector notably absent in contributing in a significant way their personnel, their thinking, to local school boards, to be facilitators in the classroom, that type of thing. We need to do more.
I think Eddie Bernice Johnson has a good idea. It doesn't go nearly far enough. I have some concerns about restricting it to first generation college students. I have concern about the minimal amount, $3 million. My experience is that will be eaten up in administrative costs before one buck gets to the classroom.
I think this is probably one of the most important hearings on this Hill on this day, and, Mr. Chairman, I applaud you and I applaud Representative Johnson for her leadership, and we need followership and I'm going to be among those that are going to follow and try to embellish, improve, expand, because we're talking about the nation's future.
And unless we do a better job in science and math and technology education, we're not going to have the workers we need in the industry of tomorrow.
Thank you very much.
Chairman SMITH. Thank you. Mr. Gutknecht has requested one minute.
Mr. GUTKNECHT. Yes. Mr. Chairman, I will be very brief. I want to associate myself with the comments that have been made, especially by my distinguished colleague from New York. Also, I want to thank you and the staff for putting together a list of very distinguished panelists and witnesses for us today.
I only regret, and I just want the panelists to know, that we currently have—I currently have two other meetings going on at the same time. So please do not feel that because some of us have to go in and out, that we don't think that this is a very important issue.
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We are clearly—we are in the middle of the information age and we are not going to be able to continue to grow and prosper the way we have in the last four or five years if we don't have good young people stepping up and moving into this vocations.
So, again, I thank you all for coming and I do apologize that some of us will be going in and out. It's not because we don't think this is an important issue. It's because our staffs just piled meetings on top of meetings for us.
But thank you very much.
Chairman SMITH. Well, we are looking forward to compelling testimony that is going to be so exciting that nobody would dare leave.
Let me introduce the distinguished group of panelists today. Dr. Jane Kahle is the Director of NSF's Division of Elementary, Secondary and Informal Education, in the Directorate of Education and Human Resources. Dr. Kahle is here to give us NSF's perspective in the role of public-private partnerships in encouraging students to pursue math and science.
Mr. Gerald Borders is the Director of Public Affairs at Texas Instruments, in Dallas, Texas, and is here to talk about the involvement of Texas Instruments in math and science education.
Mr. Buzz Bartlett is here from Lockheed Martin Corporation, where he is the Director of Corporate Affairs. He will share the perspective of another major corporation's involvement in math and science education.
Dr. John Thorpe is the Executive Director of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics and will provide the viewpoint of mathematics teachers.
Finally, another teacher of mathematics, Dr. Manuel Berriozabal, who is Professor of Mathematics at the University of Texas-San Antonio, who is here to give us his perspective as Director of the Prefreshman Engineering Program.
Gentlemen, before swearing in witnesses, I would also like to add that a Michigan group I mentioned in my opening statement, Focus Hope and the Greenfield Coalition, has submitted testimony for the record and, without objection, their testimony will be entered into the record.
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Chairman SMITH. As you may know, it is our policy to take an oath before witnesses begin. If you would rise and raise your right hand.
Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Let the record show that each witness answered in the affirmative. That means unlike the latitude that members of Congress have, we like to also minimize the spinning.
I think, Dr. Kahle, we will start with you, so please proceed. We have a lot of questions, also, so the best you're able, we'd like you to watch the monitor and try to come as close as possible to the five minutes.
TESTIMONY OF JANE KAHLE, DIVISION DIRECTOR, DIVISION OF ELEMENTARY, SECONDARY AND INFORMAL EDUCATION, DIRECTORATE FOR EDUCATION AND HUMAN RESOURCES, NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION, ARLINGTON, VA
Dr. KAHLE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and ranking member Johnson, and the members of the Subcommittee. Whether you're leaders or followers, you're all important to this effort.
I want to thank you for the opportunity to address these important issues connected with improving science, math and technology education for all American children.
Director Colwell, from the NSF, has asked me to extend her regrets to you. She is unable to attend today because of pressing business with the National Science Board.
On behalf of the Director, I want to extend the foundation's thanks to Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson, for her support of the National Science Foundation's programming and her standing commitment to excellence education for every child in this country.
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Indeed, Mr. Chairman, the nation's need for talent in the technological critical employment sectors requires us to improve the educational performance of all students. The National Science Foundation has prepared the ground for the legislation before us, as well as improved achievement of its K–12 students in math, science and technology.
I would like to discuss briefly the initiatives that are in place at the National Science Foundation. Established initiatives include the K–12 systemic initiatives for states, urban communities and large rural areas.
Those initiatives seek to improve whole educational systems by simultaneously addressing curriculum, instruction, teacher education, assessment, policy, governance and resource alignment.
The second initiative is the development and dissemination of high quality instructional materials that include rich content and that incorporate teaching strategies known to improve student performance.
Third, implementation sites that provide information about curricula and materials and assist communities and teachers in identifying those that are appropriate for their students. Assessment materials that are aligned with standards based curricula is another thrust.
Next, teacher enhancement projects that improve both the content knowledge and the teaching skills of our K–12 instructional workforce, including the large-scale local systemic initiatives that address whole school districts and utilize standards-based curricula to enhance teaching skills and content expertise.
Technology projects link teachers and networks to promote professional interactions and to provide access to research knowledge and quality curriculum. Advanced technology education centers that improve the education of future technicians in our country by linking secondary schools with two- and four-year colleges and universities.
More recent efforts include the interagency educational research initiative that places heavy emphasis on developing and assessing the effectiveness of new educational technologies, as well as research on early childhood cognition.
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Digital libraries, an internet-based resource providing teachers, students and faculty with access to cutting-edge materials and teaching strategies.
Most recently, the graduate teaching fellows in K–12 education, by which graduate students serve as content resources for K–12 teachers and students, simultaneously learning some pedagogical skills in a real world classroom setting.
The partnerships that have been fostered by NSF programs, we believe, are the keys that unlock the doors to quality education. Our large-scale projects, specifically the systemic and local change initiatives and the instructional materials projects, have for some time utilized collaborating partnerships to achieve measurable success.
The key stakeholders in this partnerships include local education agencies and boards, area higher education institutions, business and industry representatives, civic and community groups, and informal science education groups.
NSF encourages and indeed, in some projects, insists or requires a leveraging of resources from business and civic groups, state and Federal sources, private foundations and other groups. Indeed, in 1998, the 36th state, urban and rural systemic initiative projects reported over $750 million in leveraged resources, evidence of strong partnerships.
NSF believes that there are four components of an excellent educational environment and all of our programs are predicated on the need to make high quality standards-based curriculum instruction available to all students.
The components of an excellent educational environment include curriculum and instructional materials that draw on the latest knowledge and research and are based on proven instructional strategies; teacher professional development activities that provide all teachers with the knowledge and skill to prepare students for the increasingly technological workforce; assessment activities that provide multiple ways for students to demonstrate knowledge; and, most importantly, support from the community.
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Through its programming, the National Science Foundation seeks to energize and strengthen each of these components, treating them as parts of a greater whole. NSF supports partnerships and the extended assessments that are the heart of this bill and hopes to work with you to broadly develop the concept of partnerships and assessment in all of its programs and activities in order to improve science and math education for all children.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman SMITH. Thank you, Dr. Kahle. Mr. Borders.
TESTIMONY OF GERALD L. BORDERS, DIRECTOR, PUBLIC AFFAIRS, TEXAS INSTRUMENTS, DALLAS, TX
Mr. BORDERS. Thank you. Good morning, Mr. Chairman and members of the Subcommittee. Thank you for giving me this opportunity to speak to you about the importance of public-private alliances and attracting students to the study of mathematics and science. To the Texas representative and my own Congresswoman from the State of Texas, Eddie Bernice Johnson, good morning to you, as well.
I'm Gerald Borders, a Dallas resident and Director of Public Affairs for Texas Instruments; I am also proud to serve as a member of the Dallas County Community College District Board of Trustees. At this moment, Mr. Chairman, I would like for Steve, if he could, to pass around something that you can't buy at stores every day, it is an eight-inch wafer produced at TI and on it is literally hundreds of semiconductor chips. In the briefcase is also a dissection of a Nokia phone. Inside of the phone, you will find that there is a DSP chip that we are very proud of at TI, because we are the world's leading designer and supplier of these digital signal processing and analog technologies.
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These are actually the engines that are driving digital electronics.
Chairman SMITH. It would be appropriate at this point to mention that my daughter works for Motorola.
Mr. BORDERS. Mr. Chairman, not at this point. Our semiconductor chips meet the extraordinary challenge of turning sound, temperature, light and other analog signals into digital data and then back again as fast as they happen in real time.
The technology is in the cellular phone that you are looking at, the modem in your computer, and the analog brakes in your car. Responding quickly, making products that perform in real time are ideas that permeate the electronics industry because technology is changing at such a rapid pace.
Because we have long understood that highly skilled people are our life blood, TI has made educational excellence the cornerstone of our community involvement for decades. We actively support programs along all levels of the education continuum, from model pre-school programs to continuing education for our employees.
Because we are seeing a declining pool of graduates prepared to work in our industry, we are placing, as a company, a special emphasis on reading, math, science and exposure to technology. We are also working to increase the representation of minority and women in our industry.
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TI has worked actively with schools in Texas to improve education at various grade levels. One initiative that I wish to highlight is our alliance with the National Science Foundation. In 1997, TI aligned with the NSF to support far-reaching improvements in math and science education. That initiative, now continued through the urban systemic program, addresses the disparity between the math and science performance of students in public schools versus their counterparts in suburban schools.
Under the NSF/TI alliance, TI supports all the USPs by helping them to integrate learning technologies into their school districts. TI does this by training a core group of teachers who then train their peers.
To further demonstrate this commitment, TI and NSF agreed that working intensely with a selected USP school district and statewide programs would better demonstrate the success of learning technologies. To this end, TI has signed a memorandum of understanding with New York City, New York State, and the Island of Puerto Rico.
At TI, we believe that the work of the NSF is groundbreaking. That is why we're working to create an alliance between NSF and more than 3,000 companies of the American Electronics Association.
Now, let me turn to H.R. 1265. In the high tech society of the present and future, strong math and science skills are a prerequisite for success. The Math and Science Proficiency Partnership Act introduced by Representative Johnson recognizes how important these skills are and seek to ensure that American students are ready to meet this challenge.
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This legislation would assist in the establishment of school-business partnerships that promote literacy in mathematics, science and technologies, using the expertise of the National Science Foundation.
At TI, we know firsthand experience what partnerships can achieve. We also know what the NSF can achieve. Additional funding aimed at improving literacy in these areas will return the investment many times over.
Because our future is so linked to technological innovation and because these innovations will be discovered, refined, implemented and ultimate reinvented by children now learning their ABCs. We must do all we can to nurture the interest of young people in math and science.
This bill before the committee addresses this need. We sincerely urge you to support it.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Borders. Mr. Bartlett.
TESTIMONY OF RAYMOND V. (BUZZ) BARTLETT, DIRECTOR, CORPORATE AFFAIRS, LOCKHEED MARTIN CORPORATION, BETHESDA, MD
Mr. BARTLETT. Good morning, Chairman Smith, members of the Subcommittee.
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As was mentioned, I'm the Director of Corporate Affairs for Lockheed Martin. I handle community relations corporate-wide and I take care of our philanthropy programs, which includes our foundation.
Our corporate philanthropy program is $10 million, two-thirds of that sum goes for education and 800,000 of that per year goes, directly or indirectly, to K through 12 education.
Lockheed Martin has chosen to concentrate its community relations programs on the systemic improvement of K through 12 education and I devote nearly two-thirds of my time to that effort.
To that end, I am also a member of the Business Roundtable Education Working Group, the Maryland Business Roundtable for Education, and the Maryland State Board of Education. My testimony today draws on my experience with all those organizations.
Lockheed Martin is, above all else, a technology company. We employ more than 60,000 scientists and engineers and write more lines of software code than Microsoft. Our concerns, like those of this committee's, is to increase the number of students in the math, science and information technology pipeline.
Over the last few years, we have been unable to fill all our entry level openings in information technology and electrical engineering. Our focus is on education programs that aim to improve the achievement not of the top third of our high school students, but the other two-thirds, to awaken in them a sense of curiosity about the natural world that draws them to careers in math, science and information technology.
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We have been deeply involved in the movement to introduce standards, assessments, and accountability in our nation's schools. With a number of years of testing behind us in many states, including Maryland, the evidence has now accumulated, pointing to the need for increased teacher professional development and to the introduction of more rigorous curricula.
To the extent that H.R. 1265 supports that goal, we are soundly in support of it.
Most, if not all of our 50 operating companies are involved in programs in their schools. I'd like to focus on one in particular. Lockheed Martin Missile Systems, in Gaithersburg, Maryland, has, for the past few years, participated in an intern program for students, much like that envisioned in the partnership program you're talking about.
The program is organized to introduce the participants to the world of work and to make information technology more attractive.
Not surprisingly, the first hurdle we had to get over in instituting our program was our managers' lack of confidence in the capabilities of students, one experienced with their own children. In spite of such reservations, however, working with the High Technology Council of Maryland, which served as the program coordinator, Lockheed Martin Missile Systems initially placed a total of ten students in their intern program.
Skepticism aside, the greatest challenge then is now and as is typical of most internships, is to find a champion inside the business. That champion has to find people who will take on an intern and who have useful work for the intern to perform.
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I doubt that it's any different in your own offices. Even large companies find it difficult to devote one person to the task of coordination.
Once such a person is identified, typically a believer, who squeezes it onto their existing job, you're lucky if they can continue the work year after year, especially given the changes of the business.
This is not something your bill can speak to unless it's to create paid positions.
In the interest of time, I'm going to skip ahead to one other particular area of issue in Maryland, and that is the use of interns and liability insurance. Many companies in Maryland will not accept unpaid student interns because of liability insurance issues.
Because unpaid student interns are not covered by workmen's compensation, the companies are very reluctant to risk having them on premise. It's a problem the Maryland General Assembly has yet to solve. It's one I could also place at your feet, as well.
I would also like to speak very briefly to the practice of donating computer hardware and software. Most businesses, I like to think, are beyond the point of donating and schools are beyond accepting obsolete hardware. Obviously, some equipment can still be used to teach keyboarding, but too many schools can't afford the maintenance that comes with this old equipment and need to look a gift horse in the mouth.
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On another level, business needs to recognize the power that comes from a substantial donation and use that occasion to force a school or school system to develop a technology plan, if they do not already have one. That plan should be integrated with the LEA's plan, which should, in turn, be aligned with the state-wide plan.
Let me say, by way of conclusion, that private participation in a math, science and information technology project should be part of an overall program that teaches how we apply these subjects in the real world. Certainly, there are students who respond to the academic side of subjects. More students, the other two-thirds, respond to how these subjects are used in the world around them.
These are the students we need to awaken and doing so should be integral to H.R. 1265.
Thank you for this opportunity to share my thoughts.
Chairman SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Bartlett. Dr. Thorpe.
TESTIMONY OF JOHN A. THORPE, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, NATIONAL COUNCIL OF TEACHERS OF MATHEMATICS, RESTON, VA
Dr. THORPE. Good morning, Mr. Chairman and members of the Subcommittee.
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Chairman SMITH. Good morning.
Dr. THORPE. Thank you for inviting me here today to discuss the Mathematics and Science Proficiency Partnership Act, and thank you, Representative Johnson, for introducing this important bill, which can lead the way to advancing mathematics and science learning for America's children.
I'm John Thorpe, Executive Director of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. NCTM, which represents more than 100,000 mathematics teachers, has been a leader in improving mathematics education. Our standards for curriculum, teaching and assessment have helped to raise the mathematics achievement levels of our nation's students.
NCTM is updating these standards to reflect the current mathematical needs of students, our increased knowledge about teaching and learning, and recent advances in technology. Our new document, Principles and Standards for School Mathematics, will be released in April 2000.
As NCTM works to improve mathematics education, we look to others to pioneer in our efforts. We are encouraged by the innovative ideas initiated by H.R. 1265. This bill addresses two important needs, the need for improved mathematics and science education in grades K-12 and the need for professional development of mathematics and science teachers.
Mr. Chairman, many of our most serious problems in mathematics education occur in urban and rural schools, especially in the poorer communities. One in five children in our nation lives in poverty. According to the 1990 U.S. Census, urban children were more than twice as likely to be living in poverty than those in suburban locations and 22 percent of rural children were poor in 1990.
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These children go to schools that put them at greater risk of dropping out. According to a study conducted by the University of Texas at Arlington, the needier the school, the more likely it is to use out-of-field teachers. While only four percent of instructors in Texas were uncertified at elementary schools with a poverty rate below 25 percent, more than ten percent were uncertified in schools with poverty rates above 75 percent.
The study concluded that these figures have strong implications for student performance on state tests in grades three through eight and grade ten. In the year 2000, school-aged youth will comprise one-half of the nation's poor. This is far beyond anything the United States has seen before, even during the Great Depression.
For years, academic achievement of students in high poverty areas has been significantly lower than the academic achievement of students in more affluent areas.
As the authors of NCTM's poor communities report have stated, there cannot and will not be excellent mathematics education in this nation unless and until we have quality mathematics education in every classroom. A key to improved mathematics education lies in addressing the needs of urban and rural schools.
This bill will provide funds for a demonstration project that can point the way towards significant improvement in mathematics and science education in poor communities, in both urban and rural settings. Through partnerships, schools and businesses will be able to work together to provide richer opportunities for students to learn mathematics and science.
Even more important than the business role is the role of the teachers. This is clearly recognized in the bill, through its attention to the professional development needs of teachers. The teacher is the critical link between the potential for all students to learn mathematics and science and the reality of students who do learn and even become excited about mathematics and science.
Our nation's students need and deserve to be taught by teachers who are experienced in their fields, teachers who are up-to-date on the research available on effective teaching strategies, teachers who are well equipped to motivate and encourage our nation's diverse student population.
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It is the teacher more than any other single factor in our nation's education system who influences what mathematics students learn and how well they learn it.
According to the National Center for Educational Statistics, approximately 40 percent of the nation's teachers are teaching outside of their area of professional competency. This must change.
We need qualified teachers in every classroom, teachers who have sound preparation in mathematical content and in how to teach that content. These teachers also need to have high quality ongoing professional development programs, tied to what they teach, with opportunities built into the professional lives for interaction with their colleagues, to collaborate and share trials and successes in the classroom.
The general public and our policy-makers must go beyond the rhetoric and commit the resources needed to provide schools and teachers with the support they need to improve. We recommend that the teacher development activities supported by H.R. 1265 be of significant durations, more than a one-day workshop, and that follow-up activities be included in the plans.
The Mathematics and Science Proficiency Partnership Act is a stepping stone which allows us to set forth professional development activities in at least a few of the nation's schools. Hopefully, it will be a precursor to greater Federal investment focused on improving mathematics teaching and learning in urban and rural schools.
Thank you again for the opportunity to present our ideas and thank you for taking the time and effort to make this a priority. I look forward to your questions.
Chairman SMITH. Dr. Berriozabal.
TESTIMONY OF MANUEL BERRIOZABAL, PROFESSOR OF MATHEMATICS, AND DIRECTOR, THE SAN ANTONIO PREFRESHMAN ENGINEERING PROGRAM, THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT SAN ANTONIO, SAN ANTONIO, TX
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Dr. BERRIOZABAL. Good morning, Mr. Chairman and Subcommittee members. I want to express my appreciation to the members for providing me an opportunity to present an overview of the Texas Prefreshman Engineering Program.
Chairman SMITH. If the gentleman will yield. We will be recessing briefly for a vote in the next ten minutes, but please proceed, Doctor. Proceed now.
Dr. BERRIOZABAL. I am the Director of the San Antonio Prefreshman Engineering Program, the State Coordinator for the Texas Prefreshman Engineering Program, and National Coordinator for Proyecto Access.
I will dwell on the founding component of TexPREP; namely, the San Antonio Prefreshman Engineering Program, to give you documentation on what a long-term intervention program can achieve.
Since 1979, San Antonio PREP has been conducted as an eight-week mathematics-based academic enrichment program for middle school and high school students interested in science and engineering careers and other mathematics related careers.
The program is separate from and in addition to the instruction these students receive in their classrooms during the regular school year. San Antonio PREP is a partnership of at least 70 local, state and national public and private agencies, including the State of Texas, NASA, nine local community and senior college campuses, and local school districts and other collaborators.
For example, USAA, Southwestern Bell, AT&T, Sed W. Richardson Foundation are major contributors.
San Antonio PREP charges no tuition or fees. Financial contributions and in-kind manpower and facilities contributions from these agencies meet all program expenses. Some objectives of PREP include improvement of the high school graduation rate, the college entrance rate and the college graduation rate, particularly in science and engineering.
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Special efforts are dedicated to the recruitment of women and minority students. Seventy-seven hundred middle school and high school students have completed at least one summer of San Antonio PREP, 78 percent have been minorities and 54 percent have been women.
Our office maintains a database on all our participants and conducts an annual follow-up of them until they complete college. After much persistence, we received responses from 2,408 of 4,085 college-age former participants in the 1998 follow-up. Their high school graduation rate is 99.9 percent. The college attending rate is 92 percent and the college graduation rate is 90 percent.
Fifty-two percent of the college graduates are science, mathematics and engineering majors, and 69 percent of these are minorities.
Since 1986, San Antonio PREP has been replicated throughout Texas, as TexPREP. Although 50 percent of our students come from economically at-risk circumstances, PREP has proved that under the guidance of competent and caring teachers, these students can acquire the necessary quality educational preparation to succeed in college.
PREP scholars develop abstract reasoning skills and problem-solving skills which will become increasingly important in functioning and thriving in our future technological society. PREP offers the following lessons. If our people are going to be prepared to function in the mainstream of society and become future leaders in our increasingly technological society, we must become advocates for an educational philosophy that stresses personal excellence and wholesome intellectual development and become opponents of the philosophy that makes our children feel good for doing poor or mediocre work.
We must condemn those educational programs and reforms that would substitute the mere acquisition of computer skills and access to the internet for intellectual development. We must support programs which stress the acquisition of self-esteem through hard work, commitment and achievement, and oppose those that stress the acquisition of self-esteem as an end in itself.
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Otherwise, many of these students, through no fault of their own, but rather the fault of our educational system, may be doomed to enter dull entry level jobs with basic high tech applications.
We ought to set the possible highest standards for all students. San Antonio PREP has shown that students can and do live up to them. Some explanations of the success of the PREP partnership are the following: PREP is a well organized and highly structured mathematics-based academic enrichment program which stresses the development of abstract reasoning skills and problem-solving skills.
Our written curriculum, developed by PREP teachers and students, is available to any prospective site which is interested in starting up PREP. PREP has high, but reasonable expectations of its participants. The program attracts students who enjoy learning and has a zero tolerance for students who do not.
PREP is an inclusive program which welcomes both minorities and non-minorities. PREP has refused to succumb to pressures of becoming an all-minority program. PREP offers a wholesome interaction for hard-working students from all ethnic backgrounds.
PREP maintains a database on all its graduates. Each current sponsor and benefactor receives a copy of our annual report. Because of the program results, most sponsors and benefactors maintain their partnership with PREP and new sponsors are recruited.
As appropriate, sponsors and benefactors receive diskettes and listings, as authorized by graduates, to be used for recruitment opportunities and special programs, college entrance, and permanent or temporary employment.
So what can the public and private sectors do to encourage more students to pursue engineering and science careers? I strongly recommend that the public and private sectors identify pre-college programs, like San Antonio PREP, which have a proven record of achievement and provide long-term support for their enhancement and replication.
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For example, for $300,000, approximately 100 students could participate in PREP. Of these, past results suggest that at least 80 would complete the program, 79 would graduate from high school, 73 would enter college, and 66 should graduate from college, with 34 of these students being awarded degrees in science or engineering.
These numbers, I believe, are significant and are based on PREP's proven track record.
We must also support generous college scholarship programs for low income high school students who excel in college preparatory programs in high school and condemn those programs which would award scholarships to high school students who earn B averages in easy high school courses, but who eventually fail college.
Consequently, I would certainly endorse private sector participation in awarding college scholarship funds to academically high-achieving 12th grade students under the provisions that priority be given to financially needy students; they participate in mathematics, science and information technology programs, either in regular schooling or outside of it, and have demonstrated a commitment to pursue a career in mathematics, science, engineering or information technology.
As we do in PREP, we must have high expectations of our students. They will learn that through hard work and commitment, they can become our future educated and productive citizens, masters, and not servants of our future technology, and future leaders of our society.
Thank you very much.
Chairman SMITH. Thank you. The Subcommittee will stand in recess for approximately ten minutes while we run over and vote.
[Recess.]
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Chairman SMITH. The committee will come to order. We will start with the questions of the members. I think my first comment/question is that the dollars that the Federal Government contributes to this effort is very small relative to the gigantic task ahead of us.
In my mind, the only way that we can justify spending on such things as the systemic effort that only involves ten state programs, for example, is to consider these a pilot project, where we can gain knowledge and apply that knowledge of what works best across the whole country.
We have been in the systemic program for about ten years now. Ms. Kahle, it seems to me that it's time to start analyzing the kind of curricula that works best in what kind of environment, particular education environment, whether it's inner city or rural, whether it's rich or poor, and start deciding how we can best get that kind of information out, how we can best decide on what tools and from the Bronson burner to whatever else might excite those students.
So I would like to start with you, Dr. Kahle. Isn't it time for us to start analyzing what works and what doesn't work?
Dr. KAHLE. It not only is time, but I think there have been concerted efforts to do that. One of the problems with the systemic initiatives or any large-scale effort, and last time I was here, I was here from Ohio systemic initiatives, which I directed for eight years, is the time lag between helping teachers develop new skills, learn to use new curricula, develop their content knowledge, and the translation of that into more effective practice in the classroom.
With the time that we've had the systemic initiatives, we now are getting large-scale assessments of the effectiveness of certain teaching strategies. To my knowledge, they do not focus on specific texts, but we have the AAAS evaluation of the current mathematics textbooks, which have demonstrated that the top four textbooks that are enabling improved achievement in the systemics and in other districts are all NSF-supported.
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The data, I think, will be coming out in a public way, a more public accessible way, very shortly. The large-scale studies have been done primarily by Stanford Research Institute to inform the continuing systemic initiatives and are fairly technical. But we certainly have the capability of translating those studies.
Chairman SMITH. I guess my next, the follow-up is, are we taking advantage of the experience that's derived from the private sector, Mr. Bartlett, in terms of what you have found to be successful and not successful, how you decide on your efforts to cooperate, motivate teachers, putting quality people in the classroom, developing curricular, your comments on how you decide what is successful and not, and how do we end up getting this kind of information to NSF so that we can use that as part of the database.
Mr. BARTLETT. I think you've gotten your arms around one of the key issues for business, and that is how to know what works. None of us, myself included, typically come in here to this part of our work as educators and over the years we learn as much as we can. But we're always fetching about for what's working, what's not.
As a head of a foundation, I'm getting opportunities all the time to invest in curriculum programs. I think we all have this vision now of teachers who go to their in-box with a waste basket and just clear them out, with all the materials that come offering new curriculum ideas.
So I think whatever you can do to help. I'm not sure that business can take this one on. I'm not sure who does. I know there is the Eisenhower Clearinghouse. There are other things that tell you what's out there that works, but typically in the business community, a lot of us are fetching for what's the right thing to do for that school and what has worked elsewhere.
There is just not good central coordination.
Chairman SMITH. In deciding, Mr. Bartlett, what schools Lockheed Martin goes into, do you consider whether they're already involved in the systemic initiative or some other program?
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Mr. BARTLETT. No. We typically do it simply geographically. If the school is near our plant and we can get the people there to the plant, that's the one we're going to work with and that's almost the case across the board.
Chairman SMITH. Mr. Thorpe, in terms of the effectiveness of the teacher, would you personally choose a teacher, if results and motivation are the goal, would you choose a teacher in the first six or seven years of K through six or K through seven, would you choose a teacher that has a modest knowledge of science and math, but is tremendously capable as a teacher with love, et cetera, where would you go on that?
Can you do a yea or nay?
Dr. THORPE. It's a tough one to do yea or nay on. You've got to have certain minimal mathematical and science capabilities in order to do a good job in the classroom, even at grade K-1. Given that, given that you have a minimal mathematical expertise, clearly what you know about teaching and teaching strategies is really critical and your enthusiasm for mathematics and science and dealing with students is really key.
Chairman SMITH. Representative Johnson, we'll move on and we'll hopefully have time for a couple rounds.
Ms. JOHNSON. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Dr. Kahle, do you think there is merit in piloting or demonstrating programs in six, eight or ten locations in the country to maybe determine what does work? Because it appears to me that the companies that would be a part of these partnerships are not all located in the same places around the country, but where they are located, they clearly would be the scene of the workplace in that area.
And is there something to be gleaned from experience of knowing what's going on in these areas by teachers or students?
Dr. KAHLE. Briefly, yes to both questions. I think all of the NSF's successful programs have built upon very well crafted pilots that have been very thoroughly assessed and evaluated for effectiveness, including effectiveness in children's learning.
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The dispersion of the pilots around the country is much less of an issue these days because of the electronic communications that we're able to set up among the districts and the corporations and the National Science Foundation.
What I would caution us about, what we would hope to work with you to do, is to make the investment enough so that there is a true pilot of a comprehensive program. For years, the National Science Foundation funded in education what we call categorical programs. They were too small to make the kind of impact that is noticeable or measurable.
So I would caution us against pilots that are not visible and large enough to provide the necessary data to move forward.
Ms. JOHNSON. What do you think would be enough money to demonstrate?
Dr. KAHLE. I need someone here to advise me. I think a gob of it, myself. Certainly, we can use the systemics as a model. The systemics each had up to—the state systemics, that I know the best—up to two million dollars in five years.
There are two things important about that. They were large enough to get the attention of, in my case, state, in other cases, urban districts or rural districts, and they were also continued so that we had a chance of getting evaluative data within the period of the project.
Ms. JOHNSON. Mr. Borders, in Dallas, we have had one—well, in Texas, we have the urban systemic program and certainly TI has added a great deal to the quality of educational offering within the Dallas schools and surrounding districts.
Has TI seen that as a worthwhile investment?
Mr. BORDERS. We certainly have, Congresswoman Johnson. As you know, our support is substantial in terms of dollars, if you want to talk about dollars, but it's also substantial in terms of donation of items and volunteer hours spent in the classrooms.
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We've also got several models that show that once corporations get involved with the educational systems, that you find a way of measuring the effects of your dollars and time spent. We also find at TI that it is great, it is the worthy thing to do in collaborating not only with other companies, but with the various independent school districts throughout your city or throughout your state.
Ms. JOHNSON. Now, $300,000 from the National Science Foundation would be a small amount, but could that leverage a great deal of money with the private sector partnerships?
Mr. BORDERS. Congresswoman Johnson, the answer to that would be yes. I don't think I would be the person to tell you how much money it would take, but I would say to you that this bill and the amount of money that is requested in this bill opens the door to broader involvement, and we at TI would certainly support it on that.
That it's another piece of what we need to do. Our nation is facing an imperative. So your bill moves us along that paradigm. It's a continuum. It's a part of what we need to do.
Ms. JOHNSON. Thank you very much. TI has about half of the market in chips in the world, Motorola has about ten percent. But they're good Texas companies. Good Texas companies. For Lockheed Martin, you've done a lot where you're situated as well and I wonder, if we had a little bit more involvement, if you think that we could perhaps get a great deal more support from not just your company, but a number of companies that would invest in our future by helping with the education of young people.
Mr. BARTLETT. I think that when you bring a specific program to someone like me in a company that has identifiable goals and has a purpose that fits in the systemic initiative, there will be a response to supporting. You used the phrase before of leveraged funding and Mr. Borders wasn't sure exactly what the percentages would be, and I don't really think that's an issue.
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I think if you're there at the door with the idea, which has a clear purpose, a clear role for interns, things like that, the people will respond.
Ms. JOHNSON. Thank you very much.
Chairman SMITH. Mr. Boehlert.
Mr. BOEHLERT. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. A quick preamble. The church I go to, St. John's in New Hartford, New York, once a year, the priest himself gives a hellfire and brimstone speech about church attendance and the need for a sense of reverence in our lives.
And about midway through, I feel like raising my hand saying, ''but we're here.'' So I don't want you to misinterpret, Mr. Borders and Mr. Bartlett, what I'm going to—my line of questioning, because you're here and you're obviously doing something.
But I have a strong feeling that we don't have enough from the private sector, as we talk about this partnership. For example, Mr. Bartlett, you said, with great pride, that your company spends about 800,000 a year on K through 12 education. That's not nearly enough.
You're doing something and a lot of others aren't doing anything, but I would suggest the Fortune 500 probably spends more for local identified golf give-aways than they do on education. And once again, you're doing something, so I applaud what you're doing, but I want something more and I would hope you recognize the something more.
And, Mr. Borders, I didn't notice any figures in your presentation about what TI is doing. My thing is this. We really need a partnership. We need government to participate more actively. The best intentions in the world are not going to solve the problem. We need cold, hard cash, and I, for one, will expend some money of the taxpayers to do that.
But I also recognize that industry has got to step up to the plate and has got to put something in the plate. So I would like to know, for example, in TI, if you have any numbers that you might be willing to share with us and what you're doing to help support.
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And you can submit it for the record, if you don't have it readily available. I understand that. But I think you both get the drift.
I look across America and I wish you'd both go back to your corporations and ask your CEOs to take a survey of all your employees, tens of thousands of employees, how many of them are serving on school boards in a volunteer capacity across America and are serious about trying to help improve the curricula in the science and math and technology education.
I'm afraid you're going to be disappointed by the answer. So there's so much more we can do. We can strengthen the partnership, but it really has to be a partnership with not just people coming before this committee and telling us to do more. I'm very hopeful that in the not too distant future, people will come one after another to tell us what they're doing in partnership with us.
And to my colleague, Eddie Bernice Johnson, who's got a good idea and I want to help her with it and embellish it, I notice the list of co-sponsors, all Democrats. I hope you've got some Republicans.
Ms. JOHNSON. Yes, we do.
Mr. BOEHLERT. Good. That's great. I mean, because this is a—education is something that's bipartisan in nature. In the $3 million, my experience has been, unfortunately, that you give $3 million across America and then the various education agencies tell us how much of that $3 million is actually used for administration.
Then you begin to discover that actual scholarship money that would go out from a $3 million pilot program would be about a buck and a half. There is something wrong with that.
So I thank you for appearing here today. I want you to think hard about this. I would appreciate both Mr. Borders and Mr. Bartlett, for the record, when you go back, if you would provide a little more specifics on how much in terms of dollars and cents and the extent of your partnership, and I hope you will consider me a friend and ally willing to work with you to get more companies to step up to the plate, like TI and like Lockheed Martin.
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But to think of $800,000, that's a senior vice president's salary, without perks.
Chairman SMITH. Mr. Boehlert, they might have a response now.
Mr. BOEHLERT. So do you get my drift and then would you respond in any way you care to to what I'm saying, in general?
Mr. BARTLETT. I understand your concerns. I think most companies' philanthropy programs are at the one and a half to two percent of after-tax profits, and that's where Lockheed Martin is. We have a foundation of $17 million across the corporation, ten million out of corporate headquarters. Two-thirds of that ten million is for education, most of it for higher ed, and the 800,000 or so.
But I think that giving you those figures doesn't really get to the point you're really trying to make, and that is we have 160,000 employees across the country. We're at over 50 operating sites. Are they all involved? I can't give you a comprehensive answer. I know some of my colleagues who serve on state boards elsewhere in the country who are involved.
I certainly don't believe they're involved as much as I would like, because I think with our numbers, we have the strength to do a lot more than we do do. And I recognize the other part of your challenge, and that is how do we get the rest of the businesses to pony up some time and some funds in a thoughtful way so that it really can help a new Hartford High School or—I happen to have grown up about 20 miles south of you, all of the schools in that rural area, where there aren't even many businesses left to help.
So I appreciate what you're saying.
Chairman SMITH. Mr. Borders.
Mr. BORDERS. Thank you very much, Mr. Boehlert. I certainly understand the question and we will certainly get back to you in terms of numbers. My colleagues are here with me and we will certainly do that.
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But I would like to also say that I've been with Texas Instruments for 34 years, a long time, and education and participation in education have been a cornerstone of our corporation for years.
And to measure that in dollars, the number would be phenomenal and I am sitting here just at this point, just last month, we did $1 million to just one community, Dallas area, in a rural community, an urban community, to be able to give kids an opportunity to have access to education that otherwise would not have.
As a result of just that million dollars, which was a drop in the bucket to TI, 842 students will be entering community colleges in September.
Just last year, we did a little over $2 million to Paul Quinn College, in trying to resurrect a college so that the students in that community, again, that would not have access to higher ed, were able to do so.
And the list goes on and on and I quite agree with you. I would say to you that TI, not only from the corporate leaders who sit on committees, and sit on boards throughout the State of Texas, but we have employees and retirees that are doing the same.
In just one school, for example, in the southern sector of Dallas, we have 17 retirees that go into this one school. This one school, three years ago, was number 17 out of 22. Because of the volunteerism that you talked about, that school has been number one four times in the last five years, warranting a visit from the——
Chairman SMITH. The gentleman's time has expired. Mr. Etheridge.
Mr. BOEHLERT. Let me say this, Mr. Chairman. You are here, just like I'm in the church on Sunday to hear that sermon.
Chairman SMITH. Mr. Etheridge.
Mr. ETHERIDGE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Let me thank Mr. Boehlert and associate myself with many of his remarks. I think he is on target. Let me thank each of you for coming today.
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Let me approach this a little different. For your benefit, before I came to Congress, I was the State Superintendent of Schools in the State of North Carolina for eight years.
I appreciate his remarks, because what he's talking about were many of the things we tried to implement; business partnerships, ten years ago, parents involved in education, we adopted the national standards that the math and science teachers put out. I admire you for it, because I think those were important.
And we put algebra in, one of the first states in the nation to require it of all children to graduate. But you can't do that unless you do what you've talked about, and that is get the teachers ready, because not all teachers are.
We could do it because we have a state school system, not a system of schools. There is a big difference.
Some would call it top-down, where the state pretty much runs it and do the flexibility at the local level. But unless you can train all your teachers and get them up to standard on the state curriculum, you're using a shotgun and you're going to miss a lot of the opportunities.
If you look at the results, you will see that North Carolina is one of the top states in the nation in terms of growth in mathematics.
That leads me to my question, because as I look at the numbers, and you've touched on it, we talk about math and science today as needing that to provide jobs for young people to get in technology, which is very important. Don't want to minimize that, because I think that's critical, because if you look at the areas where they go in North Carolina, my state is fifth in terms of job growth in the high tech industry.
If you look at the industry growth over the last couple of years, 35 percent of our economic growth in this country is coming from, in some way, the high tech sector and 75 percent of the best jobs, paying good money, are coming out of the high tech.
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But the important thing is that everyone needs that, and I think we're missing the boat.
My question becomes how would we be broader? We've done a lot of that in North Carolina, pulling groups together, but I think the thing we are missing and we fail to realize that when we ask industry to contribute money, it's a pretty good indication we don't have enough money. Otherwise, we wouldn't be asking industry and foundations to put money in education.
So I get perplexed when I hear some of my colleagues sometimes talking about there's too much money in education.
Obviously, it's not there. Otherwise, they wouldn't be coming to you to ask for dollars. Part of it is for staff development, is woefully inadequate, can't teach what you don't know, but what you've been helped to do.
I would be interested in our two business colleagues and others, if I have time, to touch on this, because training of the staff, because we're short teachers already. We aren't going to get new people right away. So we've got to work with what we have and give them the skills to do a better job in mathematics and in science, to attract women and minorities into the field.
We can't filter them out, because if you don't have them all taken, you filter them out. Quick comment on that, because I am interested in that deeply.
Dr. BERRIOZABAL. Thank you. I think you bring up some very good points. I believe, of course, the teacher is very critical. For example, over the years, I proposed that perhaps, at least in the interim, we should be training elementary school teachers who enjoy teaching mathematics and science as mathematics and science teaching specialists in the classroom.
In fact, I think the elementary level is probably the most important level that we can reach students. If we can reach them and prepare them, they'll move ahead. So you need to have your very best teachers and we need a reward system to attract the teachers into the system.
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But unfortunately, we do have some teachers who don't enjoy teaching mathematics and science, and I think, as a former superintendent you're aware of this. I'm aware of this. So we need to do something about the teacher corps, particularly at the elementary and middle school level.
Another thing I believe we need to do, and this could have a direct bearing on our ultimate teacher corps, is, as one speaker said earlier, we need to bring the level of mathematics and science learning up for all students, and this is true. No one would disagree with this.
But we need to impact on certain students who have an interest, special interest in mathematics and science, and to those who go into teaching, and encourage some of these people, through special programs to improve them, not only improve themselves, but push themselves forward faster, and maybe some of these people will go into science and engineering teaching, particularly at the elementary level.
Mr. ETHERIDGE. I think that's why this bill is so important, because it has good resources that would help with it. But, Mr. Chairman, I would like to hear the business folks just touch on that, if they would.
Mr. BARTLETT. I think the most useful thing that business has been able to do is bring the cloud of jobs to the policy debate at the state level, to force the kinds of testing that—to standards—that helps show you where you——
Mr. ETHERIDGE. Where your results are.
Mr. BARTLETT. Similarly, I hope we also bring an expertise that helps figure out whether the budgets are being used the best way possible, but certainly I'm aware of all the successes that you had and have had and are having in North Carolina, and I think it's because there's been an extraordinary partnership between business and the State Department of Education in, as you say, a state system to point you in the right direction and ultimately to identify the issue of which teachers need help, all of those problems.
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But I think that that's been the most effective role of business at the debate.
Mr. BORDERS. Thank you. There's a couple of things I would like to touch on. One is that over the years, we have recognized that the business acumen is really helpful in educational processes in a couple of areas.
One is to be able to measure the effectiveness of the teachers processing, the teachers' managerial skills. We also bring to the educational arena the ability to be able to provide technological training that otherwise schools do not have. So in addition to the dollars, the business acumen is very important to your teachers and to the independent school districts, sir.
I believe that those partnerships reap merits that we've seen over the years that are phenomenal, I think that go unidentified by the school districts, quite often. I mean collaborations with the school boards sitting in policy-making-positions, going to Austin, lobbying for changes in school systems, is important.
So it takes everybody. It's a holistic approach, and I'm hoping I'm answering your question.
Mr. Etheridge. You're right. I think that's why this bill is so important. It sets some opportunities for that. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman SMITH. Mr. Ehlers. Mr. Ehlers, of course, is one of our leaders in developing ways that we might improve science and math education. Mr. Ehlers.
Mr. EHLERS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I apologize, I missed most of the testimony. I was at another meeting and I have a committee markup going on now. So I don't dare to ask any questions, because you may have already covered it.
I will just make some comments to follow up on Mr. Boehlert's questions and comments. The chairman of the committee has asked me to take the lead on trying to improve math and science policy in this nation, that was the last Congress, and math-science education in this Congress.
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I spoke to about 10,000 scientists over the past two years on the issue of science policy, but one thing I emphasize in every speech, and that relates to Mr. Boehlert's comments, that scientists and engineers and mathematicians have to become more politically aware and more socially responsible.
And I didn't mean to imply that you're socially irresponsible at this point, but my definition of becoming more socially responsible is that every one of them who has any modicum of ability to express themselves should be going to the nearest local school, elementary or secondary, and saying, hey, I'm a scientist or I'm an engineer, I'm a mathematician, and I really like what I do. It's really exciting, I enjoy it, and could I just talk to your kids for 20 minutes to tell them what I do, so they know what a real scientist or engineer or mathematician does and get them excited about it.
I think also they could go beyond that and offer to help the teacher with any questions or materials they might need. Running for the school board would be admirable, as Mr. Boehlert has pointed out.
There's so much that has to be done, that almost anything that's done will help. Now, this bill is also in that direction of trying to help the problem we have. I'm hoping that as a committee and as a Congress, we will be able to put together a comprehensive program that will really move us from nearly the last of math-science scores in the world to the top.
It takes time. There are so many different factors; not just something like this bill, but there's curriculum overall, there is recruiting, training, keeping good teachers, a host of different issues that have to be addressed.
But I think a very important part, and that's what this hearing has been on and that's what Ms. Johnson's bill is bringing out, is that we have a great resource and our scientists, engineers and mathematicians and their corporate employers throughout this nation, and we're not really tapping into that as well as we should.
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I appreciate what you're doing. I hope you can do more. I hope you can get others to do at least as much as you're doing.
Ms. JOHNSON. Mr. Ehlers, before you leave, thank you very much for your comments and I certainly appreciate all you've brought to this committee.
Chairman SMITH. Mr. Ehlers, you yield your time?
Mr. EHLERS. I'd be happy to yield time to Ms. Johnson.
Ms. JOHNSON. I'm going to solicit your help, as I have, too, with trying to adjoin you, whatever. What we really need to do is do something. We've got to move in that direction.
Let me say that an element that I think is also important is teacher networking, so that they can communicate. CEOs coming to the superintendents, which I'm convening this August 29 in Dallas. TI is probably the superb example that I'm aware of in our area, and it's not just a million here. I mean, they've given millions of dollars for the benefit of educating, preparing our teachers and educating our young people.
They certainly have shown that they understand that they have a great stake in the quality of education. I guess what we need is more like TI. But I would like to invite you, as I have Mr. Smith, to come to the Dallas area, and I'm willing to go other places, to see some of the things that are going on.
Texas and North Carolina were the only two states that showed gain in the math scores and science, and I think that it indicates that something positive is going on and perhaps we can add to it, and I'm very open to it. And whatever that is, I can tell you that TI has played a very major role in it in Texas.
Mr. EHLERS. Thank you. I yield back the balance of my time.
Chairman SMITH. We will start a second round, because that will give me another five minutes to ask some questions. We have approximately 15 million high school students. If you take the total amount of dollars, approximately 112 million that we're putting into the systemic initiative, I mean, if that were spread among our students, it would amount to roughly eight dollars per student. If we add another $3 million to that effort, that's another 20 cents a student.
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It just seems to me, Eddie Bernice, that our final goal has to be a broader application. So part of the question in, in as much as the Federal Government only contributes about five percent of the total K through 12 cost, how do we excite states, how do we do a better job exciting state governments who oversee the individual—the education programs within their particular states to move ahead in this arena.
I hear comments that maybe we pay additional dollars to motivate quality science and math teachers to come into the system and stay in the system, instead of taking the lucrative dollars that are out there as they might go into industry.
I have an argument with my wife and I would like to ask you the question, if you agree with Bonnie, then I try to smooth it out as best you can. But I feel that we—with the kind of technological world that we're moving into, that every—I'm trying to really give you an impassioned argument on my side—that every student, regardless of the careers that they go into, has to be better educated in math and science.
So I suggested to Bonnie, who is liberal arts and a teacher, that even liberal—even in our liberal arts curriculum, if they're going to understand the dynamics and the challenges ahead of us, that we even need to have more science and math in those curricula, and any response, just try to be on my side as much as you can, Mr. Bartlett.
Mr. BARTLETT. I absolutely agree with you, from a number of points of view. Our society is highly technical. From a Lockheed Martin point of view, if I'm going out in community relations to deal with a citizenry that thinks that eight parts per billion TCE in drinking water makes it unfit, I've got a problem. They don't understand science and I have a difficult time teaching them in that kind of heightened situation what's dangerous, what's not dangerous.
As we go into biotechnology, the same issues are driving us. The history of the world for the last 300 years has been the history of technology. And you just can't get by without teaching technology at some level, not the periodic table of the elements, but rather how do things work, how do you ask good questions. That's the argument I believe is—
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Chairman SMITH. I'm going to ask all of you to react to maybe the two goals that I picked out. That is, how do we excite and encourage more corporate interest and effort in this area, how do we excite more state interest in terms of state legislatures and state departments of education.
I mean, if we're going to cover these 15 million students, somehow it seems to me that we've got to broaden out that effort, and, Dr. Kahle, with you, and we'll go right down the line.
Dr. KAHLE. You've really touched on two very difficult issues. It seems to me that we have excited state governments with the TIMMS results, with the NAEP results from the states that do them by state. We've also excited them, I think, through the systemic initiative programs from the National Science Foundation. Those are large enough, they've gotten the attention of large groups of people in the state, and the states have changed policies and practices to conform with the best that we know in science and math education.
They also, states, as well as the corporate world, are, I think, genuinely and seriously concerned about the quality of the workforce in this country and as the jobs are moving more and more into the technological fields, there is more and more interest from the corporate world.
We have science and math coalitions, partly sponsored by NASA, partly by NSF, in almost every state in this country, that are heavily sponsored and involved with business and industry people.
So it seems to me that as they become more technological, needing that workforce, States will become more active. There certainly is a history in my part of the world, in the Cincinnati area, of corporate involvement.
Chairman SMITH. Mr. Borders.
Mr. BORDERS. The question that you've asked is a very good one. In order to bridge the gap of understanding of what's happening to technology, I had to bring props to you to talk about a DSP, digital processors, analogs, what's happening with that whole thing, sometimes the teachers that are in the classrooms are inadequate, because there is an understanding gap when you talk about technology. It's moving so fast, that we ourselves have to keep up with it, Mr. Chairman.
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What needs to happen more is that more businesses, and we found this to be very helpful, more businesses need to open up their doors to the educational institutions. For too long have we waited for the school systems to bring the students to us. There is a real need, again, for collaborations and alliances between businesses and the schools.
There are some schools, sir, in urban and rural areas that have never seen a DSP, wouldn't even know it if I talked about it. There are some students there that do not understand the internet and what it does for them and connecting them to libraries.
What we found, when we bring those kids into our environment is that their eyes light up. There is something inside of these kids that creates activity, that they go on to succeed in things that otherwise they wouldn't have. We would have written them off.
So opening the doors for businesses, and we're doing a lot of that with the AEA its 3,000 members, where we're all getting together and training teachers. We're making opportunities available to teach technology to those teachers.
So collaboration. Participation is another one. Going to Austin to talk with the legislators, like we're doing today here in D.C., is another part that businesses have to understand that we must do. This is not an island in terms of education, sir.
Chairman SMITH. Mr. Bartlett.
Mr. BARTLETT. I can only echo the comments. Whatever we can do to help, especially with the elementary school teachers, to help bring in scientific phenomena, things like Mr. Borders was talking about, what we do, where we bring in small little rockets and teach kids propulsion theories like that and they get to shoot off this, that or the other on space day.
Those are the kinds of things that the teachers appreciate, especially if they are tied into the curriculum. So that's there.
Chairman SMITH. Dr. Thorpe.
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Dr. THORPE. Just following up on that, how can corporations and industry help with the teachers in the schools. I think one of the easy things to do, and everybody does it, is give equipment. But one of the most difficult things for teachers to use is the equipment. They're not qualified, they don't understand the implications.
The web potential is great as a resource, as an educational resource. But so many teachers don't know how to use it and they're scared of it.
If industry could go one step further and not only donate the equipment, but donate some human resources to help the teachers learn how to use that equipment, I think that could be mutually exciting for the industry people and for the teachers.
Chairman SMITH. Dr. Berriozabal.
Dr. BERRIOZABAL. Thank you. It's been my experience in the past, in trying to get funding for the PREP program, to replicate it other places, that I will approach some industries and simply say, well, we're supporting other programs.
Sometimes the programs that they support are programs that probably are not really working. But there has been a connection made between the program director and maybe the person in charge of corporate relations of a company or something like this and it's difficult to break off.
And so industry itself I think at times needs to evaluate what it's doing and even make hard decisions on what they're going to support and not support, particularly to support good programs.
I would also urge industry, not as individuals, but as collections, to get together, identify good working programs, and, as a group, go to the legislatures and say we think this is a good program or these are good programs, these are good educational practices, they need to be supported, and we will match a state's contribution for support of the program.
Chairman SMITH. Representative Johnson.
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Ms. JOHNSON. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I'm on the wife's side. We do need to continue the liberal arts, business that's one of the ways, Mr. Chairman, that even our businesses can become aware of the ethics in many of this technology. I believe very strongly that every shopping center that has a game alcove ought to have computers in there, but they don't think that's going to make them enough money.
The point is as we sit here and talk about what we should do and what comes next, even in our technologies, the goal post moves. This era of technology has come on very rapidly and it has moved very rapidly. We can't afford to keep waiting around and see what we're going to do about it, as we have done, whether we're going to tax internet or not tax it, whether we're going to regulate it or not regulate. The goal post moves while we are discussing it.
And that's the one thing that makes it a little bit more pressure on us to start to look at something we can get started. The rationale behind this bill is not to be the answer to all, but to be a launching, so that we can go somewhere. The thinking is that we—and I'll make it as big as you want to make it, Mr. Chairman. I'll even let you rewrite it and it can be yours.
I just want us to do something, because we're moving backwards of we stand still, because the movement is still going forward.
It's important that we make the assessments. It's important that we have it. I focused on the first generation college student because if we can do it for the least of these, then obviously it will work for the most of these. But we can move it to any way you want and the more you—you know, you call us liberal spenders, but the more we spend, the better I like it on programs like this.
So you can't spend too much for me. I limited these dollars to attract you.
Chairman SMITH. It's just not near enough.
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Ms. JOHNSON. It isn't. So you have my full permission, Mr. Chairman, to just take it to whatever level you'd like. I am concerned about—you know, a superintendent said to me about six months ago, Mr. Chairman, that for years, I passed Texas Instruments and wondered what was going on in there.
If a superintendent of schools is honest enough to say that, can you imagine what our teachers would say and wonder about what's in there. We've got to remove most of this mystery. We cannot maintain our competitiveness unless we build good workforces.
Our companies cannot reach the next levels unless they have the people to help them go there.
When you have to stop long enough to develop software that makes it color coded because people can't read, then this holds our companies back and competitiveness is what causes us to move forth, as you know.
So I plead with all of your support and I plead with your support and I'm grateful that Mr. Boehlert has offered to help and I hope Dr. Ehlers will. Dr. Ehlers is a Ph.D. in nuclear physics. He's a physicist. So we've got the brains here, if the non-brainers don't keep stopping us.
Mr. Chairman, I'm pleading with you to become a partner with me and helping us to move in the right direction, and I really thank you for having this hearing. It's been really a joy to work with you on this and other things, as well.
Chairman SMITH. Hopefully, we both agree and we don't disagree. My goal would be to expand it to as many schools as we can and it seems to me that the director of NSF has now committed herself to trying to develop what we've learned so far and what works and what doesn't work and what kind of communities and hopefully we'll proceed.
The gentleman from New York.
Mr. BOEHLERT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'm going to try to help save your marriage. You're both right. Not surprisingly, I'm a quintessential moderate. But the fact of the matter is what we have today in our society is people who are outstanding in communications skills and can't add, and we have engineers who can't communicate, and we need to do better in both areas.
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But because of the high priority in science and math, we have really got to focus a lot more of our energy and resources and talent in those disciplines.
For our industry friends, Mr. Bartlett, is that Waterville?
Mr. BARTLETT. It's actually North Brookfield.
Mr. BOEHLERT. North Brookfield, all right. I just wanted to make sure. I knew the right school district. When you said 20 miles south of New Hartford, I figured it out.
Every corporation of any size in America has their various plants issue economic impact statements, because they're of great value to everybody. I would suggest you give some consideration to developing education impact statements in your various communities and talk about, with pride, your very responsible companies, what you're doing, to impact in a positive way on education; how many people are on school boards, how many of your staff are in the classrooms as facilitators for the teachers, and you have some union problems and I understand that. But we've got to deal with these things.
Secondly, I would hope that you might consider, Mr. Borders, you talked about the great work you're doing where your corporate headquarters are, and I hope you develop sort of a model program, because TI has a lot of plants in a lot of communities and you can get it out there to make sure they're doing in Oregon and New York and everything else what you're doing in Dallas.
And, Dr. Kahle, it used to be, and I hope it still isn't the fact, but I think it is, that the majority of our youngsters in K through 12 in America today are taking science and math from teachers who are not specialists in those disciplines, and I think that's still a fact.
That is a sad commentary on where we are today. So I just would challenge our committee, under your leadership, Mr. Chairman, to think beyond the pail, to go way beyond. I mean, we've got to think big. This is serious business. It determines your level of competitiveness in the international community, because Lockheed Martin and TI are not just competing against the company down on the street. You're competing against the company in Korea and Hong Kong and Singapore. We've got to do a much better job.
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I've been here year after year and we keep talking about it and we keep throwing a few bucks at it, but that isn't nearly enough. We've got to do more on this side and I challenge the corporate community to do more, and I certainly want to work with you.
I thank you for what you're doing. I'm going to be back with both of you and I would hope you would be back with us.
Dr. Kahle, if you've got any current figures on where we are, I've talked to Dr. Colwell about this, and I think it's a fact, that's a sad commentary.
Dr. KAHLE. It speaks very well to the America discussion we've been hearing about. Not only does there need, in my opinion, to be more math and science and liberal arts, but particularly in teacher education. If you have an elementary teacher going through an English history degree and then picking up some pedagogy at the end of that, you have a person who has less math and science in his or her undergraduate years that we had in the old days under teacher education within schools of education, and that is a fact that has been overlooked by colleges and universities and other places.
Mr. BOEHLERT. And believe me, it is much, much broader than what we're talking about today. For example, if you get a youngster who majored in science or math, graduating this May from a good school in America with good grades, chances are that youngster is indebted, has had to borrow his or her way through college, and that youngster looks at TI or Lockheed Martin and looks at the offer he or she can get from TI or Lockheed Martin, and I would suggest they're probably starting out in the 40-plus range, they also might really want to teach and then they go to a good school district, and I live in a nice community, with a good school district, and they might start at 22 or $23,000 a year.
What does that say about where we are in our society? So we've got to take a much, much broader look at this whole thing, because the youngster is going to say, well, I'd rather teach, but there's a $20,000 difference in starting pay and I've got to pay off my student loan and Suzie and Jenny want to get married and start having their own family, and so they may go reluctantly to industry instead of the classroom, and they would far rather be in the classroom, but they can't afford to be there.
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So we've got to do something. That argues for more money for student loans and a whole bunch of other things, but once again, thank all of you for being resources for this Subcommittee and thanks for contributing everything and I'll honk my horn the next time I go through North Brookfield.
Chairman SMITH. I would like to give all of the witnesses a chance for a wrap-up, and I'll sort of signal when two minutes are up, and, Dr. Berriozabal, we'll start with you and go across the opposite way this time.
Dr. BERRIOZABAL. I think what the committee is doing is very important to the country, to the future of this country. I believe we're going to have to face our decisions in education, what really needs to be done and have the will to do it.
I, again, reiterate that we need to improve our teacher corps. We need to make particularly elementary school teaching very attractive, to get our very best minds into the schools.
We need to identify these students, though, these future teachers, at an early age and maybe we need to do two things then. We need to get these students in teacher preparation programs before they get to college. That's number one. Number two, we need to improve the competencies of our current corps of teachers. There are many fine people out there who are very much interested in doing so, except they do not have an opportunity, they don't have the resources.
So that's the thought I would leave with you today.
Chairman SMITH. Dr. Thorpe.
Dr. THORPE. The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics is just finishing up a project where we're updating the standards that we created—curriculum standards that we created about ten years ago, to take into account all the developments that have happened since then.
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These standards are certainly going to have a major impact on state standards and local standards and all that. They're going to have a major impact on the classroom.
In order to really go into the classroom and have an effect, teachers are going to need to be informed about the standards. They will need opportunities for professional development in order to implement those standards, and teacher education schools will have to take that into account.
The teacher preparation and teacher professional development is really key to all of this. It's key to what this bill is all about, as well, and we need to look for ways, in partnership with industry and partnership with everybody who is out there that can help the schools, to try to bring up the level of the teachers, to help them do what they are trained to do and what they need to do in the classroom.
I think that working together, we can all do that. We're certainly eager to work with you at NCTM and work with our partners in industry.
Thank you.
Chairman SMITH. Mr. Bartlett.
Mr. BARTLETT. I think that the main points have been said, but if I were to speak directly to the pilot program here, it would be wonderful if a program could be developed that could be easily replicated for the kinds of teachers we're talking about, who have had, in the elementary school, one or two hours of math and science in college and they're not prepared to teach math and science to their students.
If we can develop a program here that sets the pace for helping the non-math and science trained elementary and junior high teacher to teach those subjects, I think we will have gone a long way towards working that issue.
Thank you.
Chairman SMITH. Mr. Borders.
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Mr. BORDERS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'd like to finish by a few points that I had written down a few moments ago after listening to everybody.
Is this bill the end all? No, it isn't. It's certainly a part of the answer. We talked here today about getting businesses involved in education. We believe this bill that Representative Johnson has introduced allows us to do that.
And this statement that I wrote down was companies like TI are involved we'll continue to be involved in efforts to improve education, but there's a lot to be done and not all companies have the abilities and resources or commitment that TI has.
The bill opens the door to broader involvement from business community, in both urban and rural areas. It's part of the answer. It is not all of it. But I ask and urge you to support this bill.
Chairman SMITH. Ms. Kahle.
Dr. KAHLE. I have really appreciated the discussion very much and will relate it to Dr. Colwell. I particularly appreciate Representative Johnson's offer and your acceptance of it to continue discussions, to mold and shape this bill, to align with current comprehensive programs of the National Science Foundation.
The infrastructure is in place. Ten years of work has built a comprehensive infrastructure in materials development, based on the national and state standards, in the local, state, urban and rural initiatives, materials to which provide districts that are used to working with industry, that are used to working with their state governments, to improve math and science education, as well as with the National Science Foundation.
We've also laid the infrastructure by increasing the emphasis on assessment, on insisting that assessment include student learning outcomes, as well as changed teaching practices. So I think the infrastructure is here, the time is right, and I look forward to more discussions.
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Thank you.
Chairman SMITH. Well, thank you all very much. We've sort of glossed over the word sciences, but I hope all of you know what Aridopsis Aleanna is, because that's the subject of our hearing next week. It's a mustard plant that grows on my farm and what we expected, the geno-cataloging that we expected to be done in the beginning around 2007, we're now looking for it to be completed within the next two years. So biology and what we're doing in these areas, and its impact on how our world is going to change is also very significant as far as an understanding.
I would like to say, in closing, that certainly I think it's appropriate that we've had this hearing today. Yesterday was the funeral of George Brown. He was the former chairman of this committee, ranking member of this committee, very interested in pursuing science and math education as part of the success of whether or not we continue a strong economy in this country.
He was a leader in this area. I respected him as a tremendous individual, as well as a leader in the scientific endeavor.
With that, I thank you all again, and this Subcommittee hearing is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 12:19 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]
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