Does the U.S. Have an S&E Workforce Crisis?

One continuing challenge states and regions are attempting to overcome is adjusting their workforces in a rapidly changing, innovation-driven, global economy. The growing consensus emerging from many people examining science and technology competitiveness is that U.S. students need to be academically stronger in the science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields than they are today and that the supply of graduates with a science background needs to increase. This advice comes as other countries around the world, with populations large and small, pursue this same strategy to increase the quality and quantity of future workers with backgrounds in science and technology.

 

In response to this challenge, education policies and new initiatives at the federal, state and local levels are focusing on the preparation of students for careers in science and engineering (S&E) fields. However, a report released in October questions if enacting policies to increase the number of STEM students and improve the quality of students are the most efficient means to supply the S&E workforce.

 

In Into the Eye of the Storm: Assessing the Evidence on Science and Engineering Education, Quality, and Workforce Demand, B. Lindsay Lowell from Georgetown University and Hall Salzman from the Urban Institute argue the U.S. education system actually “produces qualified graduates far in excess of demand.” Their calculations show there are about three times as many graduates with S&E degrees than S&E job openings in the U.S. each year. From a supply perspective, the authors state the absolute number of S&E graduates at all degree levels in the U.S. is increasing, as well as the proportion and number of students who finish high school. Additionally, U.S. high school students’ exposure to science and math, and the quality of American students’ science and math performance is increasing over time. In reality, the authors conclude the U.S. ranks internationally among the best countries – a contrary stance to other studies.

 

By deconstructing data collection and ranking systems used to compare countries, Lowell and Salzman claim the notion that the U.S. is falling behind its competitors is unsubstantiated. Factors that should be considered when examining the rankings and data include the collection of countries in the comparison group, how rankings are related to statistical significance, the specific subjects tested, and the differing age and school experience of students from the countries taking the tests. A more fitting description of U.S. performance, they contend, is the U.S. is not the highest performing country in any single math or science test, but is one of few countries that both is consistently above average in terms of academic performance and is steadily demonstrating academic progress across grades and a variety of subject fields over time.

 

The problem, the authors conten, is the inability of S&E companies to attract the current pool of S&E related graduates. Of course, not all graduates in S&E fields will take an S&E job as individuals alter their professional interests, act on location-specific or other related career preferences, lack the necessary qualifications for many job postings (e.g., experience), or pursue new degrees in other fields. But even considering attrition from the S&E fields, it seems there is an adequate amount of employees to fill the needs of industry, the authors conclude.

 

Lowell and Salzman encourage researchers and policymakers not only to examine the S&E workforce/graduate data in aggregate, as has been often employed in many widely circulated reports, but to consider trends and needs from a supply and demand perspective within specific S&E fields. In terms of policy development, the research may suggest increasing S&E education experience – from high school through Ph.D.s – is not as important as meeting the specific demand for limited science aptitude within the fields of industry that are seeking workers.

 

As a whole, the numbers of S&E Ph.D. graduates are continuing to escalate, as reported in an InfoBrief recently released by the National Science Foundation (NSF). It states U.S. institutions of higher education awarded 29,854 S&E doctorates in 2006, a 6.7 percent increase over 2005, resulting in a 9.6 percent increase over a 10-year period. Additionally, women attained 8.8 percent of the S&E doctorates in 2006. Non-U.S. citizens received 45.2 percent of Ph.D.s in the S&E fields.

 

The possible excessive supply of Ph.D. students was illustrated in an article from The Chronicle of Higher Education. In “The Real Science Crisis: Bleak Prospects for Young Researchers,” Richard Monastersky reports that the academic job market in science is changing faster than graduate programs can accommodate. For many Ph.D.s in the sciences, professors are having a harder time obtaining grants, and postdocs are struggling to obtain tenure-track jobs. The story cites external data describing how 70 percent of physics Ph.D.s become temporary postdocs today, compared to 42 percent in 2000. Additionally, even though the number of doctorates in biomedicine has nearly doubled in the last two decades, the number of tenured and tenure-track positions have not increased in that same period.

 

Due to increased competition for research resources, researchers are spending more time applying for grants and not receiving them. Some schools have now instituted programs known as bridge funds to prevent laboratories from closing while external funds are in short supply. Even though the number of Ph.D.s is increasing in almost all subject areas, some schools are beginning to cut back on opportunities to earn degrees. The Chronicle article reports Brown reduced its incoming class of biomedical Ph.D. students by 20 percent this year and the University of Pennsylvania by 12 percent.

 

Within each field of science and engineering, it seems the nuances of supply and demand will be affected by the availability of research grants and employment opportunities, the skill needs of emerging technologies, and the policies of universities and governments at all levels.

 

Into the Eye of the Storm: Assessing the Evidence on Science and Engineering Education, Quality, and Workforce Demand can be accessed at: http://www.urban.org/UploadedPDF/411562_Salzman_Science.pdf

 

From NSF, U.S. Doctoral Awards in Science and Engineering Continue Upward Trend in 2006 can be found at: http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/infbrief/nsf08301/nsf08301.pdf

 

The Real Science Crisis: Bleak Prospects for Young Researchers from The Chronicle of Higher Education is available at (with subscription): http://chronicle.com/weekly/v54/i04/04a00102.htm

 

Also available is a 30-minute interview from Nov. 9 edition of National Public Radio’s Science Friday radio show. The interview features a discussion on the Into the Eye of the Storm report with author Harold Salzman, and a critique by Craig Barrett, chairman of the board for the Intel Corporation, and Shirley Malcom, head of education and human resources at the American Association for the Advancement of Science. It is available at: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=16150041