“America, Mr. Beach writes, cannot compete with China or India in churning out engineers. Instead, the United States can thrive by being more innovative. Stronger math and science skills are needed, he writes, but so are other skills, which he calls the “5C’s — critical thinking, communication, collaboration, creativity and confidence.”
-Steve Lohr, Reporter, New York Times “Bits” Blog
No nation’s empire lasts forever. America’s reign as global scientific
leader is coming to an end by the end of this decade. The annual global
competitiveness report from the respected World Economic Forum reports
America is now the #7 nation in its ranking of 130 countries. Should
Americans have a problem with this statistic? The answer is yes, when
you consider that as recent as 2007 the U.S. was ranked #1 in the world.
Gary Beach author of THE
U.S. TECHNOLOGY SKILLS GAP: WHAT EVERY TECHNOLOGY EXECUTIVE MUST KNOW TO
SAVE AMERICA’S FUTURE (Wiley, $35.00, August 2013) deliberates
how proficiency in math and science skills are the keys to the strength
of America’s economy, the employability of its workforce, and
increasingly, the vulnerability of its national security in the 21st century.
Current news coverage that our kids are not doing well in science and
math testing is not breaking news. What is breaking news is that these
warnings started to appear nearly 60-years ago, from a unique four-part
cover series in Lifemagazine entitled “Crisis In Education”,
to the 14-year continuous decline in SAT Math (and verbal)
scores that commenced in 1963, to the results of the 1964 First
International Math Study which said American 12th graders
came in 13th out of 14 nations measured in the study.
Over the past decade, national education programs like the “No Child
Left Behind” have reported nearly 70% of America’s eighth grade students
are less than proficient (less than a “B” grade) in math and
science. And over three in 10 fourth graders are functional illiterates
(“D” or less) in reading. Moreover, results from respected global
science and math assessment tests now regularly plot a trend line where
the performance of American school children continues to fall further
and further behind peers from other countries around the world,
prompting McKinsey and Company to say America’s widening education gap
is equivalent to a “permanent national recession”.
Gary Beach says “there are just too many cooks in the kitchen when it
comes to improving American education - parents, business leaders,
politicians, teachers, and teacher unions etc., all of them with a
vested interest in protecting their turf.”
THE
U.S. TECHNOLOGY SKILLS GAPis all about how America needs to find
a way to fix its’ public education woes or they will become the England
of the 21st century. America’s era of consequence, after
60-years of not listening to warnings, is upon us.
About the Author
Gary Beach (Boston MA) brings more than 30 years of information
technology publishing experience to his role as publisher emeritus of
IDG's CIO magazine. Beach is a highly regarded spokesperson throughout
the United States and the global technology industry and he has
testified on key issues facing the IT industry before the U.S. House and
Senate. From the Oval Office of the White House in 1995, Beach launched
an IT non-profit organization called Tech Corps that continues to
challenge IT professionals to assist the education tech issues of K-12
schools in America. As an expert on the role of the CIO, IT best
practices and future IT predictions, he is frequently quoted by major
media organizations such as CNN, CNBC, USA Today, The New York Times,
The San Francisco Chronicle and Business Week. From 1998 -- 2002 he
contributed commentaries on key tech issues to NPR's "All Things
Considered" program.
The U.S. Technology Skills Gap
What Every Technology Executive Must Know to
Save America’s Future
Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Publication date: August 5, 2013
$35.00; Hardcover; ISBN: 978-1-118-47799-1
