K-12 Educators are Putting America’s Industrial Leadership at Risk
Guest Opinion

Member, President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology
By Robert J. Herbold

Robert J. Herbold is a member of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, managing director of Herbold Group, LLC, and a retired executive vice president and chief operating officer of Microsoft Corporation. He holds a bachelor of science degree from the University of Cincinnati and a master's degree in mathematics and a Ph.D. in computer science from Case Western Reserve University. Prior to joining Microsoft, he spent 26 years at the Procter & Gamble Company, where he served his last five years as senior vice president of advertising and information services. He is the author of “Inside Microsoft: Balancing Discipline and Creativity,” which appeared in the January 2002 issue of the Harvard Business Review. He serves on the board of directors of Weyerhaeuser Corporation, Agilent Technologies, First Mutual Bank and Cintas Corporation. He is a member of the board of trustees of the Heritage Foundation, Case Western Reserve University, the Seattle Foundation, Overlake Hospital and the Board of Overseers of the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. He is the president of the Herbold Foundation, which provides college scholarships to science and engineering students.

The following is adapted from a speech delivered on May 25, 2004, at a Hillsdale College National Leadership Seminar in Seattle, Washington.

There are some very worrisome trends in the United States with respect to our global share of science, technology, engineering and mathematics expertise.  It is decreasing significantly, both at the bachelor’s level and at the Ph.D. level.  I will provide below the basic data that shows those trends, the reasons behind them, the attendant risks and a recommended solution.

Recently, the National Science Foundation published data demonstrating that our country is producing far fewer engineers than are other parts of the world, particularly Asia.  Note in Figure 1 that among 24-year-olds in the year 2001 who have a B.S. or B.A. degree, only five percent in the U.S. were engineers, compared to 39 percent in China and 20 percent or more in South Korea, Taiwan and Japan.  If you look at the actual number of engineers, Figure 1 shows China is producing three times more than the U.S. Figure 2 shows that the U.S. again comes out very low—even compared to European countries—in terms of the percent of all bachelor’s degrees being awarded in engineering and science. 

Figure 1: BS/BA Degrees Among 24 year olds in 2001

Figure 2: Engineering & Science Degrees as a % of all Bachelor Degrees

Another disturbing trend is in the numbers of individuals receiving a Ph.D. in physical science and engineering.  These degrees are important since they tend to spawn major innovation that generates entirely new industries.  Going back to 1987, there were 4,700 U.S. citizens getting these degrees, compared to 5,600 Asians.  In 2001, the U.S. figure had dropped slightly to 4,400 and the number of Asians had risen to 24,900.  That is a dramatic shift. We should also note that Asians are getting science and engineering Ph.D.s at U.S. universities at a lower rate than in the past.  For example, 25 percent fewer Asians got such degrees at U.S. universities in 2001 than in 1996.

This data relating to physical science and engineering Ph.D.s was assembled by Professor R.E. Smalley, a Nobel Prize-winning scientist from Rice University.  His conclusion is that, “By 2010, 90 percent of all Ph.D. physical scientists and engineers in the world will be Asian living in Asia.”

One of the reasons why our production of science and engineering talent in universities is low in comparison to other countries is that our math and science skill levels at the K-12 level are quite weak.  Note the data from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) from the year 2000 provided in Figure 3.  U.S. scores across 4th, 8th, and 12th grade levels are abysmal.  For example, in science, only two percent of our 12th graders are rated advanced and only sixteen percent are rated proficient.  NAEP defines “proficient” as “solid academic performance for the grade assessed.”  Thirty four percent of our 12th graders are partially proficient in science, and almost half are below partial proficiency. 

Figure 3:  U.S. Students; National Assessment of Educational Progress; Year 2000 Math & Science Proficiency

In Figure 4 we see the results of the International Math and Science Study.  It rates the U.S. versus other countries and provides the percentile our students achieved.  For example, in mathematics, our 12th graders rated at the 10th percentile.  In other words, 90 percent of the countries did better than the U.S., and only 10 percent performed worse.  While we do well in grade 4, and mediocre in grade 8, our 12th graders and advanced 12th graders do very poorly.

Figure 4:  Student Achievement in Math and Science;  U.S. Relative Rank (percentile) versus Other Countries

For the past 12 months I’ve been heading up a group called the Workforce/Education Subcommittee, which is part of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.  This group was formed by President Bush in 2001, and its objective is to address specific questions.  Much of what I’m providing here is the work of that subcommittee, which was charged to determine whether we have sufficient science and engineering students to support our workforce needs.

Once our subcommittee assembled the data, the key question became:  Why are U.S. student results so weak? Many groups have studied this issue over the last ten years, and they have consistently come up with a couple of key conclusions.

First, many of our K-12 students are being taught science and math by unqualified teachers.  Specifically, in September of 2000, the National Commission on Math and Science Teaching for the 21st Century noted that 56 percent of high school students taking physical science are taught by “out of field” teachers—meaning that the teacher didn’t major or minor in the subject in college.  In mathematics, this figure is 27 percent.

In January of 2003, the Committee for Economic Development reported on the same topic for middle school students (grades 7, 8 and 9) and found even more alarming data: 93 percent of middle school science students and 70 percent of middle school math students are taught by “out of field” teachers.

How can we expect a K-12 teacher who has no experience in the field to get a student excited about science or mathematics? It most likely won’t happen.  In fact, it typically doesn’t happen.  The National Research Council reports that only 30 percent of students who enter a science track in grade 9 are still interested in science as a major when they graduate and enter college.

The second core problem relates to weak curricula.  In 2003, the American Association for the Advancement of Science rated less than ten percent of middle school math books to be acceptable, and no science books.  The National Commission on Excellence has recommended that public high schools teach three years of mathematics and two years of science. But only 45 percent of high schools follow that guideline with respect to mathematics, and only 24 percent with respect to science. 

Traditionally, it has been our technical human talent that has driven our industrial success.  Basic science, technology, engineering and mathematics knowledge is vitally important in the business world.  For perspective, over 50 percent of the CEOs of our Fortune 100 companies come from a technical background.  As mentioned before, physical science and engineering capabilities at the Ph.D. level typically drive the kind of highly prized innovations that often can lead to the emergence of new industries.  With science and mathematical expertise declining in the U.S. while rising in other parts of the world, we risk seeing our industrial leadership weaken. 

Weak K-12 results in the U.S. are not a new problem.  Twenty years ago a report entitled “A Nation at Risk” was published and similar K-12 data were highlighted.  Recently the Koret Task Force of the Hoover Institution at Stanford University studied what has occurred since the publication of “A Nation at Risk.” The following is a key paragraph from their report summary:

“A Nation at Risk” underestimated the resistance to change from the organized interest of the K-12 public education system, at the center of which were two big teachers unions as well as school administrators, colleges of education, state bureaucracies, school boards, and many others.  These groups see any changes beyond the most marginal as threats to their own jealously guarded power.

We need the K-12 teaching community (the union leaders, the administrators and the teachers) to take responsibility for these poor results and generate significant improvement.  They need to get serious about accountability and teacher qualifications, which are two core elements of the “No Child Left Behind” program.  They need to implement the curriculum recommended by the National Commission on Excellence, teaching three years of math and two years of science at the high school level.  They need to support new routes for teacher certification in order to increase the number of teachers qualified to teach math and science. And they need to ease their opposition to vouchers and charter schools to allow the kind of competition that typically generates broad improvement.  Finally, they need to stop promoting unprepared students to the next grade level.

Probably most important, the K-12 teaching community needs to implement good management practices, such as performance appraisal systems that identify the top teachers.  It then needs to provide those top teachers with salary increases of 10 percent or more per year, leading to annual wages of over $100, 000 for those talented individuals.  Equally as important, every year it needs to isolate the bottom 5-7 percent,  put them on probation, and if no progress is made within the next year, terminate them. 

Additionally, the K-12 education community needs to tackle its budgets with gusto and re-allocate funds to provide aggressive financial rewards for great teachers and to introduce smart innovations.  The Department of Education points out that currently, only 53 percent of the funding is spent on instruction.  That is not nearly enough. 

In summary, the K-12 teaching community needs to take responsibility for these problems and fix them.  All of us in our individual communities need to hold that community responsible for its results.  Failure to improve these results is unacceptable and will inevitably lead to the weakening of our nation.