Preparing Students for the 21st Century Global Economy

In our August issue, we asked key leaders to submit essays addressing what they would do if they could reinvent higher education in NH. Each day, we feature a different response.

The United States makes the best, most innovative products and services, and that ingenuity and excellence is our chief economic strength as a nation. But we are in danger of losing that edge.

Science, technology, engineering and math-what we call the STEM fields-are the skills that drive innovation. Jobs in the STEM fields are expected to be the fastest-growing occupations of the next decade. By 2018, it is estimated that NH will need to fill 43,000 STEM-related jobs, yet last year the University System of NH and the Community College system of NH graduated only about 1,120 students in the STEM fields.

We all need to encourage students, early in their education, to love the STEM fields. Programs like FIRST Robotics, headquartered in NH, are making tremendous strides in giving middle and high school students hands-on opportunities to learn from professionals in STEM fields.

Across the country and in NH, colleges and universities have launched initiatives to recruit students to study in the STEM fields. Mentoring partnerships and summer workshops with middle and high schools have also successfully attracted students to campus. The issue is  retention. Currently, less than 40 percent of students who enter college intending to major in a STEM field graduate with a STEM degree. Programs that provide hands-on experience, a diversification of traditional teaching methods, access to faculty and professional mentors, and strong career development programs have proven successful at keeping students engaged and graduating with a STEM degree. 

Our nation needs a STEM agenda today that will preserve America as the most competitive and dynamic economy in the world so our students can be the leaders of tomorrow.

U.S. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), the only woman in U.S. history to be elected both a governor and a U.S. senator, has served in the U.S. Senate since 2009. Call her office at 202-224-2841 or visit www.shaheen.senate.gov.