Why should we be concerned about educating women and minorities to participate in science and engineering?
First of all, as American citizens, women and minorities have a right to a quality education and they should not be excluded from study in any field. Indeed, they should be encouraged to enter quantitative fields because we need scientists and engineers. Second, women constitute more than 50 percent of our population (and 44 percent of our work force), and by the year 2000 one out of every three Americans will be a member of a minority group. The third reason relates to a leveling off in the number of women attaining degrees in certain science and engineering fields and to the exceedingly small size of the pool of minority scientists and engineers, with no large increases projected. Fourth, the increasing number of international teaching assistants in the United States, especially in science and ...
