April 3, 2015

MAKER SCHOOLS: Bipartisan legislation in the House and Senate would provide up to $5 million a year for four years to each of 25 "manufacturing universities." Schools would gain the designation -- and the money -- based on such factors as their percentage of engineering graduates; graduate-degree holders with engineering jobs; involvement in manufacturing startups, and "the amount and purpose of the university’s R&D funding," according to a summary. Chief sponsors are Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.) and Rep. Elizabeth Esty (D-Conn.) Their minority-party status is one reason GovTrack's formula gives the bill a 1 percent chance. They're joined by Republicans Lindsay Graham (S.C.) and Kelly Ayotte (N.H.), along with three GOP House members. But they're going to need Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) and his Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, where the Senate bill now resides, to work it into a Higher Education Act reauthorization. Inclusion in COMPETES is iffy. The bill is backed by the Association of American Universities and Association of Public and Land-grant Universities, along with leading R&D firms and ASME. The 22 universities individually named in the summary as supporters appear to be mostly in sponsors' states. They include the Universities of Wisconsin and Delaware, UCs Davis and Irvine, Penn, Drexel, RPI, Clemson, and the SUNY system. See The skills gap in U.S. manufacturing 2015 and beyond by Deloitte and the Manufacturing Institute.

RENEWED VISA PUSH: Business groups are again trying to persuade Congress to increase H-1B visas, now capped at 65,000, with another 20,000 available to people with advanced degrees, CQ reports. A bipartisan group of lawmakers led by Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) wants to raise the cap to 195,000, if economic conditions are right. Another bill would let up to 50,000 advanced degree recipients to stay in the country for up to a year while looking for a job and stay permanently if working in a STEM field. Two thirds of H1-B holders are in the computer industry.

GLOBAL R&D: Legislation awaiting full House action would create a White House group to "plan and coordinate international science and technology cooperative research and training activities and partnerships" with the aim of finding new opportunities, identifying impediments, and aligning cooperation with U.S. foreign policy goals.

MOOCs - AN AMERICAN EXPORT

About 70 percent of those taking massive open online courses offered by Harvard and MIT are outside the United States, according to a paper tracking edX from the fall of 2012 to the summer of 2014.

Source: Social Science Research Network

STATE-BY-STATE EDUCATION, R&D AND MORE

The chart below, showing the number of employed doctorate holders in science, engineering and health Colorado, Kansas, and Missouri, is one of a variety of comparisons possible with the National Science Foundation's state data tool.

WHERE H1-B VISA HOLDERS LIVE AND WORK

Source: The Brookings Institution

CURBS ON NANOMATERIALS: The Environmental Protection Agency "is ratcheting up its scrutiny of nanoscale chemicals amid concerns that they could pose unique environmental and health risks," ScienceInsider reports. The agency wants companies to disclose nanomaterials they make or sell. "Observers say EPA’s move could be a prelude to tighter federal regulation of nanomaterials."

THE ENGINEERING-MEDICINE FRONTIER: "The inclusion of engineering ideas and approaches makes medicine a quantitative and systems-based discipline that facilitates precision diagnostics and therapeutics to improve health care delivery for all." So write Roderic Pettigrew, director of the National Institute of  Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering, and colleagues in Translational Medicine. (Subscription or purchase required.)

EAGER TO MAKE IT: The National Science Foundation is offering 25 EArly-Concept Grants for Exploratory Research (EAGER) of up to $300,000 to "researchers who are pursuing novel, early-stage, multi-disciplinary, and high-risk/high-reward research on cybermanufacturing systems." It "strongly encourages" collaboration between manufacturing and computer and information science and engineering researchers. Find out more. See also EAGERs for Cellular Biomanufacturing

SEEKING MORE HISPANICS: NSF wants to encourage the matriculation of graduates of two-year Hispanic-serving Institutions to four-year schools "while strengthening strategies for retention in STEM majors." It's providing supplements to PIs under a variety of programs and encouraging partnerships between two- and four-year schools.

NSF GRADUATE RESEARCH FELLOWSHIPS, managed by ASEE, have just been awarded to 2,000 individuals from among 16,500 applicants. "Among the 2,000 awardees, 1,053 are women, 494 are from underrepresented minority groups, 43 are persons with disabilities, and 31 are veterans." Find out more

EDUCATED, YET UNQUALIFIED: Our colleague Mary Lord writes: Can the United States afford to write off nearly half of its young adults because they lack sufficient literacy, math, and problem-solving abilities to succeed in today’s globally competitive economy? That challenge for educators and policy leaders lies at the heart of America’s Skills Challenge: Millennials and the Future, a sobering new study by the Educational Testing Service. Analyzing data from the Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies, ETS researchers found that the nation’s 16- to 34-year-olds – who have had more years of schooling than any cohort in U.S. history – consistently fell at or near the bottom of the pack. That held true even when comparing top performers, native-born populations, and those with the most education and highest socio-economic status. While the gaps narrowed as education levels rose, Americans with a post-secondary, non-bachelor’s degree still displayed roughly the same skill levels as the international average for high-school graduates while U.S. master’s and research degree earners placed slightly below their peers. Americans did lead the world in one aspect: having the greatest gap between lowest and highest scorers. Perhaps more alarming, U.S. skill levels declined from 2003 to 2012. These findings, note the researchers, “offer a clear caution to anyone who believes that our policies around education should focus primarily on years of schooling or trusts that the conferring of credentials and certification alone is enough.”

PRIZED COLLABORATIONS: The National Academy of Sciences has a new prize for significant advances in convergence research. The first one will go to researchers who have benefited human health. The work should include two or more of these disciplines:  mathematics, physics, chemistry, biomedicine, biology, astronomy, earth sciences, engineering, and computational science. The nomination deadline is June 15.

ENGINEERING RESEARCH COUNCIL VIDEOS: See a playlist of 11 including presentations by officials and experts from U.S. science agencies, the White House, and elsewhere. Also, watch videos from the deans' public policy colloquium.

EARLY BIRD REGISTRATION for the ASEE Annual Conference will end April 3. Find out more about registration, and housing. For other information, click here.