Focus on STEM education only, good or bad?

[nlknauss]

This topic is one of interest to me because I recently began graduate studies in curriculum and instruction with a STEM concentration. During my brief studies, I've seen that there are many misconceptions about what STEM actually is and what it should do for our students and nation.

First, STEM is lacking a complete identity because of the different interpretations of its implementation. There are a few publications that go over these interpretations but the large majority of people seem to believe that if you are doing/teaching STEM, you are using all concentrations of the subject area. If you're teaching it or studying it, you cannot withhold math. It would be like withholding the "B" from the BLT.

Second, part of the identity crisis is because people are creating alternative acronyms outside of just STEM. People mention STEAM a lot! Doesn't good design and engineering involve a recognition of form and function? If you're doing STEM correctly, you need to include skills and information from art, writing, social sciences (think about who benefits from STEM products), and other liberal arts classes. Innovation takes place when people think creatively, and a good STEM program will do that.

Putting more of an emphasis on STEM in our classrooms is probably not going to improve our nation's test score against others unless the tests are changed to reflect the curriculum. The education game in our country is much different from others, and comparing the two is tough. We've achieved great technological things in our country because we do it our way. If we're worried about competing in a global marketplace, then we need to infuse more of those skills into our current curriculum regardless of the subject matter.

So is a focus on STEM education good or bad? I'm very biased, but I believe it is good as long as it has the right focus. FIRST and other STEM related competitions normally do it right because they science, technology, engineering, and math are common tools used to teach communication, collaboration, and other skills needed for our students to function as citizens of our world. They don't need to pursue STEM careers and it doesn't hurt for them to be conscious of STEM problems and solutions. Liberal arts studies offer enrichment for the same globally needed skill-sets, but STEM studies are now just the new kids on the block because the collaborative aspects of it were traditionally not as important.

Nate

[Foster]

Lots of good comments.

I can see how you could make writing classes more towards tech writing classes than fiction. OTOH I'm not sure that I want to see the CD of 2020 with nothing but dry tech writing posts.

I'm also on the fence about the STEM job market. I know that there is a huge push for H1B visa's to fill these jobs. As someone that will soon be looking for a new STEM job (my boat trip is coming to an end), I'm pretty sure while I have the skill set for these jobs, the much lower salary will be a issue. My email is looking for people with a huge range of skills for about 3-4 times min wage rates.

I do know that large companies are moving engineering team jobs to overseas locations to take advantage of the lower pay. I know of one company that has hired about 7,000 new engineers, all of them in Asia while reducing their US workforce.

But I do see that what were the mfg jobs of my early career are starting to be more higher tech in areas like bio-science / medical than anything else. So this may be just a transition time. We'll have to wait and see.

I do think that we are not doing a good job of funding our schools and that is a real problem, STEM school or traditional school. I've watched state after state lower budgets.

[Hot_Copper_Frog]

I have so many conflicting feelings about the topics surrounding STEM education and FIRST. I went all the way up through the progression of programs -- starting in FLL, moving through FRC, graduated with a STEM degree, and now serve as an FRC mentor while working as a STEM professional.

To be honest, I've never had much interest in the robot end of things. I've always been a Chairman's and scouting/strategy student through and through, and that's mainly what I mentor now. The skills that I learned through these activities were incredibly important to my academic success while in college, and serve me well now in my career. I learned how to speak eloquently, write clearly, work with groups of very different and/or difficult people, and keep an upbeat attitude in the face of frustration.

FIRST proclaims that the Chairman's Award is the most important award in FIRST -- because it teaches us that it isn't all about the robots. In order to earn this award, the team is required to apply technical and persuasive writing skills, effective public speaking skills, the ability to improvise, marketing and imagery design, video editing skills, etc. All of these are what many people might categorize as "soft skills", but they're things that as an engineering consultant I use all the time.

I think the question we should be asking ourselves is not "are we emphasizing STEM too much?", but rather "Do we include the right subjects and skills in STEM education?".

[YAK'ker]

I am a proponent of a well-rounded education, STEM, LA, everything. What I don't like about the current direction of education in the US is that if it can't be applied directly to standardized testing, it's going to get marginalized.

That translates to most of our industrial arts, drafting, art, and music being cut from funding in public schools. It doesn't matter that these all contribute towards raising IQ's, vocational readiness, relevancy, or creative problem solving skills. Our budgets are being slashed nationwide and we have become entirely too focused on written and computerized skill assessment.

Quite a few FIRST robotics teams have been kicked out of their schools, simply because their admins don't see their value. It's important for all of us to advocate on all levels to retain and restore hands-on learning experiences, even if they aren't applicable to the Common Core standards. If anyone is interested in helping make a petition to the US Dept of Education and Congress advocating for FIRST I will help write and circulate it.

[brrian27]

I think FIRST is the perfect example of STEM education done right. In my experience during high school, FRC obviously taught me a lot about engineering and technology. I've always been interested in engineering, and FRC reinforced that. But beyond that, FRC got me hooked on business and other aspects of the competition. Now, as a college freshman, I am trying to somehow balance STEM and other interests, but finding it more difficult. But, my university does a pretty good job actually at mixing entrepreneurship and engineering.

Education needs to be less compartmentalized. As others have said, STEM majors should learn business, literature, philosophy, etc. and vice versa. I would love to see more combined majors, such as a business/engineering combo, but I don't know if that is practical or useful.

In the end, we need to be educated in more than STEM. We should be building robots, not becoming one.

[cxcad]

How is this modified STEM education different than a liberal arts education? It seems that the more we extend the acronym, the closer we come to the liberal arts ideal. There's nothing wrong with that as I personally think that a liberal arts education with a strong technical focus is great for aspiring engineers and scientists.