The Peace Dividend: Let's Invest It In Education

Earlier this year the president of the United States and the governors of the 50 states adopted a set of six national education goals. These goals call for ensuring that all children enter school ready to learn, improving student learning in all academic disciplines, making students first in the world in science and math achievement, increasing the high school graduation rate, making adult literacy universal, and freeing schools from drugs and violence - all by the year 2000. It's no accident that science and math are the only two academic areas to which an entire goal is devoted. Our nation's political leaders are fully aware that science and technology are critical to American industry, the American economy, and, ultimately, America's security. They're equally aware that our nation - for decades the undisputed world leader in science and technology - is no longer number one. Consider just a few of the facts. The past two decades have seen a steady decline in the number of U.S. college students majoring in math and science. By the end of this decade, the National Science Foundation estimates, this country will need between 450,000 and 750,000 more chemists, biologists, physicists, and engineers than our colleges and universities will graduate. In recent international comparisons, U.S. secondary school students have placed near the bottom in science and math achievement with depressing consistency. Too many students in our elementary and secondary schools lack challenging science curricula, even minimally equipped science laboratories, and - most important - qualified science teachers. Seven years ago, A Nation At Risk - a landmark education report produced by a presidential commission on excellence in education appointed by the Reagan administration - warned that one half of the country's newly employed science and math teachers are not qualified to teach their subjects. Unfortunately, that situation has not changed. In short, America has a severe science deficit that is not about to go away on its own. If this nation is serious about making American students the most scientifically literate in the world over the next 10 years, it's going to take a serious national commitment - both to education and to science. America can now make that commitment. The end of the Cold War presents us with the opportunity to re-examine and reshape our national priorities. We no longer need to maintain a military designed to safeguard American security in yesterday's world. The terms of international competition have shifted. Today's competition is increasingly economic - and some of America's fiercest competitors are also our closest allies. There is general agreement, among both military experts and politicians, that it's time to reassess America's military needs and bring military spending in line with today's global realities. Last December, a number of U.S. military experts, including former Secretary of Defense Robert Mc-Namara, told the Senate Budget Committee that cutting our military budget in half over the next decade would actually enhance America's security. Senator Sam Nunn (D-Ga.), the influential chairman of the Armed Services Committee, recently called for slashing $7 billion from the $295 billion proposed by the Administration for the next fiscal year, and $190 billion over the next five years. While there is probably no one today who knows the appropriate amount to spend on defense, there is a consensus that America no longer needs - and cannot afford - a military budget designed in the Cold War era. That amounts to a misallocation of precious resources - and an anachronism that will cost this nation dearly. There will be a peace dividend. The question is whether, as a nation, we will invest it wisely. By investing some of the money so long committed to military defense to educating our children, rebuilding our economy, protecting our environment, and redirecting our science and technology, we can build a stronger, more secure America. Consider America's allocation of resources for scientific research and development. For the past 40 years, the Department of Defense has been the predominant force in American science and technology. During the 1980s, military research and development rose to more than two thirds of all federal R&D funding. And the U.S. military gets between the 35 percent and 40 percent of our total R&D - public and private. Now, the end of the Cold War frees us to act more like our major economic competitors, whose R&D overwhelmingly focuses on industrial and social needs. Japan invests just 1 percent of total R&D in its military. In West Germany the figure is 4 percent. Many of the best minds in American science and technology work under contract to the Defense Department. That means they haven't been doing the kind of scientific research America needs to improve our industrial competitiveness, rebuild our infrastructure, improve transportation, protect our environment, improve medical technology, and prepare our children for the economic and social challenges that await them. The results come as no surprise. American military technology is unsurpassed - but our economy is in decline, and our competitors are moving ahead in civilian scientific research and technology. There's no doubt that wherever America puts its resources and its talents, America excels. The new geopolitical realities provide the opportunity to reallocate our nation's resources and talents to where they can do the most economic and social good in the post-Cold War world. That means making a serious commitment both to public education and to civilian science from elementary through postgraduate school. Keith Geiger, a high school science and math teacher from Michigan, is president of the 2 million-member National Education Association.

The Peace Dividend: Let's Invest It In Education

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Kieth Geiger

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May 1990

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