October 30, 2007

Leaders Mull Community Colleges' Role in Preparing Scientists and Engineers

Rockville, Md. — At a meeting at Montgomery College’s campus here today, higher-education leaders explored the role of community colleges in preparing scientists and engineers to improve American competitiveness.

The meeting drew representatives from academe, industry, and government. One host was Norman R. Augustine, a retired chairman of the Lockheed Martin Corporation who led the panel that produced the 2005 National Academy report “Rising Above the Gathering Storm,” which addressed shortfalls in science preparation.

The session tackled several problems in how community colleges help train scientists, including gaps in transferring credits and a lack of financial aid for transfer students because that aid is usually used as a recruiting tool for freshmen. But much of the discussion focused on getting students involved in science early, starting as young as elementary-school age.

Students need more encouragement, some attendees said, rather than discouragement from guidance counselors and talk of hard, “weed out” classes.

“We haven’t broken the paradigm of passive lectures and recipe labs,” said Jack Lohmann, a vice provost and professor of industrial and systems engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. He said learning in context with hands-on projects could be used by community colleges to get younger students motivated so they are not lost in the pipeline.

Panelists frequented cited research by the National Science Foundation, which found that 48 percent of people who received science and engineering bachelor’s and master’s degrees in 2004 and 2005 had attended a community college.

But the discussion always seemed to come back to the need for more money. “In this stormy climate, nothing could be more shortsighted than shortchanging our community colleges,” said Brian K. Johnson, president of Montgomery College. —JJ Hermes

Comments

1. And one of the best places to put the money is in K-12 science and mathematics classes. Science is exciting and should be taught by enthusiastic, knowledgeable teachers. Nothing pushes the youngest students away faster than the droners and stumblers, and once the kids are gone, they’re gone. That’s especially true nowadays, with fascinating technology in every palm and purse.

   — S. Britchky    Oct 31, 02:05 AM    #

2. Our creationist society — where the majority of Christian Americans prefer voodoo sciences like creationism and intelligent design over hard science — is always going to fall behind in the global science labs. And nowhere is that more evident than in the K-12 schools where creationist leaders keep pounding their superstitions into our kids’ heads. Or if they can’t get their agendas into the public schools, they push home-schooling for ill-training our future college students. What’s first learned is best learned, afterall.

   — darrell in dallas    Oct 31, 09:30 AM    #

3. Kids are turned on by the science they can understand. Start with kid-friendly science experience – catching bugs, identifying leaves, looking at a snake – lessons that even non-scientist elementary teachers can handle with enthusiasm. Those lessons build interest that will be channeled naturally into more complex science as the child matures enough to understand. Too often now we “teach” the details of science in elementary school, e.g., photosynthesis to 9 year-olds who have neither the ability nor the perceptive maturity to understand the overall concept, let alone the chemical/physical details of the concept. Let’s go back to what made most of us fall in love with science, the wonder of it all. Give that to children, and they will embrace the opportunity to learn more junior high and high school.

   — M J Corn    Oct 31, 10:01 AM    #

4. How I wish I had known about this meeting and attended it! It would have been convenient for me too. I live within 100 miles of Rockville, but in a Pennsylvania county that has no community college (or other college). Colleagues and I are attempting to facillitate postsecondary education here, including an emphasis on science and technology. We are so near NIH and NIST, and we are well suited as a site for smart development. Let’s not give up too soon on people. I am a victim of a creationist K-12 education, but after I was in the Army and got married I attended a community college. It was a pivotal experience for me. I then finished a BA, MA, & PhD, and had a productive career as a scientist. Now that I am retired to consulting and writing I’d like to give something back—by making education accessible to others and assuring them that they can do science. What an adventure my life has been because I chose a career in science!

   — Joe Erwin    Oct 31, 10:04 AM    #

5. Well said! I would also like to point to a paper published in 2006 by ASEE that summarizes the many advantages of starting an engineering education at a community college. The paper can be read at: http://www.asee.org/acPapers/code/getPaper.cfm?paperID=10944

   — D. Dimitriu    Oct 31, 10:12 AM    #

6. I always worry when the proposed solution to the math/ science problem is ensuring that it be taught in k-12 (or anywhere) by “enthusiastic, knowledgeable teachers.” This is true enough, but it’s the Lake Woebegon solution. We’re currently in a situation where we don’t have enough math and science teachers of any level of ability, yet the solution to the problem is to ensure that all math and science teachers are strong, good-looking, and above average. Sure, we can work to improve the teaching of math and science, but we are never going to achieve goal of having an enthusiastic, knowledgeable teacher in every (or most) math and science classroom. The law of averages says no. But even if we suspended the law of averages, how would we entice these paragons of instruction into the classroom? How about those princely salaries teachers get? Maybe it’s the super working conditions? Maybe it’s the public respect? This is a complex problem. We have to improve the teaching of math and science, but we’ve got to do a whole lot of other stuff too—perhaps some serious study of why students lose interest in these subjects.

   — Dave    Oct 31, 10:21 AM    #

7. While we can attack the Religious Right for its antipathy toward science, we must also recognize that, as a society, we are not doing an adequate job in attracting our best college graduates into the public school classroom. As a result, community colleges, at least in my home state [CA], become the “great second chance” for many.

   As for the role of the community college in preparing engineers, I believe this “second chance” role is exactly what is needed when we underfund K-12 education. At least students have the opportunity to remediate math and science preparation in the community college so they can go on for a degree in engineering. Ultimately, though, the solution will cost more, and therein lies the rub. That would mean more taxes! Horror of horrors.

   — Bob Harris    Oct 31, 10:29 AM    #

8. We need to encourage our K-12 students to enjoy science and math. There is no doubt of this importance, and one way we can do this is to provide incentives for faculty at the community college level to work with the schools in their communities. At the same time, we need to provide funding to these individuals for lab equipment, and other materials that can be used to accomplish this goal, and to make their classrooms better. From what I have seen, the states don’t seem to understand this.

   — cubing    Oct 31, 11:15 AM    #

9. Good words, Bob Harris and others. The community college I attended was in CA, which has long had a remarkably accessible system (along with the CSU and UC systems). In PA, where I live now, the systems are considerably less accessible and cost much more. HOWEVER, many employers do have tuition reimbursement programs and encourage their employees to take college courses. The “second chance” function is an important one for adult and “lifelong” learners.

   There are a lot of retiring “boomer” scientists who could be productively brought into education at all levels, often in underserved rural areas that are great and affordable places to retire. We are in a great spot for people retiring from NIST or NIH (or wanting an affordable country home).

   We can teach people how to use the scientific process to do some exciting and productive things.

   I have done some effective and rewarding teaching since I retired from my research career. In a relatively low cost (but very decent) public university, I had great students who became engaged and active learners. In a high-priced private college, I was very disappointed to find only a few really good students who were prepared to benefit from what I had to offer. I was astonished and saddened to see people wasting their money at $30K/year for what they could have gotten for $3K/year (or less) at a good community college ($600/yr in CA).

   Anyway, colleagues and I hope to assist a community college in increasing its service to our little rural county, by, among other things, teaching the courses we are qualified to teach. It will be a good deal for us, by giving us something constructive to do, and for the college and community, so we’re going for it.

   I’d like to hear from others working on similar projects in PA or elsewhere.

   — Joe Erwin    Oct 31, 11:59 AM    #

10. The comment about passive lectures and recipe labs is still true to some extent in the CCs. However, one issue CCs have is the problem of “pleasing” so many 4 year schools. It is difficult to be innovative when your curriculum is scrutinized for transfer by several 4-year schools, with different approaches. So, we tend to not change things too much until they do. This is quite unfortunate, since CC instructors usually spend more time in the classrooms and labs then university instructors and have smaller sections so therefore have more direct student contact. In other words, we at CCs should be the innovators in education but many times cannot be in fear of our courses not articulating.

    — DB    Oct 31, 12:41 PM    #

11. Hmmmm. It strikes me that there is some disconnect between CCs and the colleges and universities they wish to articulate with that could be productively bridged by some of us who have some experience with both in specific courses. I agree that CCs should be innovators, and that they ideally would be so strong and innovative that articulation would not be an issue.

    At the same time, expensive private colleges are competing with CCs for lower division students, so if they can prevent articulation, they are likely to try. Not good. The competition can be pretty rough, but I think we must all come down on the side of serving the students in the best possible way. If CCs provide good courses and good value, they will meet the needs of those they serve. Does anyone out there want assistance with the articulation problem (from any direction)?

    — Joe Erwin    Oct 31, 01:04 PM    #

12. The college where I work (Orange Coast College, Costa Mesa, CA) sponsors an annual “Community Science Night” each year. Two weeks ago we invited 3,500 elementary school children and their parents to visit workshops and labs to experience “hands on” science. More than 30 instructors and 300 students volunteer for the event each year. The photos of youngsters totally absorbed in the scientific experiments really tell the story.

    — Mary Roda    Nov 1, 12:18 PM    #

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