[SATLUG] Debunking the Myth of a Desperate Software Labor Shortage

[Hector Bojorquez]

1.  It can be argued that the current technological expansion is a DIRECTLY
tied to gov't spending during the cold war (TCP/IP, etc..all products of
 "military" research).
2.  Our current leap then, is not so much because there was SOOO many highly
educated engineers out, but because our government was actually involved.
3. So... countries who have been spending REAL money (per capita... don't
quote straight figures that sound like a lot but really aren't) on
math/science/technology  reform are now benefiting...as opposed to us who
lollygag, hem and haw, and get indignant when "our tax dollars" go to
funding public education efforts aren't welcome by all (don't kid
yourselves... your local school boards are RIFE with Anti-Science,
Anti-intellectual right-wingers AND THEY are having the last say)

Having said all that...
It is high time that the country have a push for REAL technology learnin' ,
unprecedented since the G.I. Bill... or this country WILL become
insignificant.


On 8/27/07, Borries Demeler <demeler at biochem.uthscsa.edu> wrote:
>
> ...
> > gotten into a technical field, but who says school kids need to be spoon
> > fed an education?  With access to the Internet and all these college
> > libraries online now, the knowledge is out there for the asking.
> >
> ...
> > Throwing money at schools and telling them to spoon feed an education to
> > their charges doesn't work - I was in one of the "open school"
> > experiments in the 8th grade and we learned very little unless we were
> > motivated within.
>
> Hey Al,
>
> good to hear from you on this topic! So if education is not the problem,
> what do you think is causing the problem? The US is falling behind in
> scientific publications, and we are exporting our knowledge at a record
> rate. How do you turn the ship around and get more domestic scientists?
> To me it seems right now the only thing we can do is hand out H1B visas
> to keep the people here whom we educate. I talked to some CS people the
> other day about this, and was told that enrollment was down significantly
> across the US in CS schools, and this is partly blamed on the dot com
> bust, but it doesn't look any different in non-CS science fields as far
> as I can tell. What should be done?
>
> -b.
> --
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