http://www.nationalmathandscience.org/index.php/the-problem/the-problem.html
This site and organization (however you may see the roots of the program to turn) can help out a lot of teams if they are trying to find some evidence for reasons to start a FIRST team. The site states the problems of the recent generations very clearly and with detail. I recommend teachers and students both take a look at it. Its pretty useful to drop some facts from here in any presentations you may be doing.