Posted on 12/03/2006 11:44:21 AM PST by BenLurkin
As the United States embarks on the "Second Space Age," its aerospace, science and other high-tech industries face a critical shortage of skilled engineers, scientists and technicians to do the work necessary for the country to maintain pre-eminence in space.
That message ran throughout Friday's discussions during the California Space Authority's Transforming Space Conference, a gathering of the state's various space enterprise interests.
"The Second Space Age is a new age of space exploration," said Rep. Ken Calvert, R-Riverside, honorary co-chairman of the conference.
This new age is similar to the Cold War space race in one important way, he said: "It depends on American leadership."
One oft-cited - but qualified - statistic compares the number of engineers produced yearly in the United States with other rising high-tech nations.
This country graduates approximately 70,000 new engineers per year, based on a 2004 survey, compared to some 200,000 or more in India and as many as 600,000 in China.
While noting that a wide gap in producing new engineers exists, the speakers were careful to note that the figures from India and China may be somewhat skewed due to those nations' broader definitions of engineers.
"We need to wake up. We will not be the leaders of the world we have been since World War II," Rep. Howard P. "Buck" McKeon said. The Santa Clarita Republican is outgoing chairman of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce.
"We can't just rest on our laurels. There are always people who want to knock us off that pedestal."
The problem of developing a work force of engineers is a pipeline issue, beginning with too few students willing to study math and science, McKeon said. Only half the students who do pursue such subjects in college actually graduate with those degrees, he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at avpress.com ...
No, I'm not. Just resigned, actually.
Freegards!
Both.
Know some of what my son learns, know a little snipets of what my neice and her husband learn, and what I deal with daily and it's nothing like what we hear in the spews. Perhaps, not all jobs that require a clearance but I would hazard a guess that modt are that way.
It couldn't hurt expose some truth that the presstitutes won't or can't get access to or too lazy to try to learn (too busy looking for the next I hate Bush story).
Tell me about it! Starting my 12th and hopefully final year of it to get the third child through college without her being saddled with HUGE college loan debts to pay off after graduation.
LOL!!!
My son will love that one. He's having to reuse engines that were built in the mid-fifties on the vehicles he's being tasked to build.
but, no poets.
There's plenty of demand for engineers in this country and every one knows it. But the second a college student finds out that after taking all the hard classes and working his butt off he'll never make much more than a plummer he looks elsewhere. Well, college students that aren't dumb suckers like I was at least.
When engineers make as much as similarly demanding fields like doctors and lawyers then there will not be a shortage.
May all your children have successful careers, and may they all chip in each year to give you a great vacation.
Both, IMO. There are inefficiencies, of course, lots of them. As for friends, nations have no friends, only interests. And it's in our security interest to be able to ensure our survival in an increasingly dangerous world.
The way things are going in Social Security they may need to help us just to live.
Look here
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.