Topicality “Its”

STEM DA

1NC — STEM DA

Currently there is a large gender gap within the STEM sector—Common Core standards move to fill the gap and promote an increased female role in the STEM sector

Eliminating Common Core Reduces the Amount of Women Who Join the STEM Sector—Common Core Directly Contributes to the Amount of Women Who Pursue Careers in the STEM Sector.

Common Core Encourages Women to Pursue Careers in the STEM Field, Which is Inherently Key to the US Economy

Huneycutt 14— Timothy Huneycutt is a writer for the National Math and Science Initiative (“SUPPORTING OUR GIRLS: THE KEY TO CLOSING THE GENDER GAP IN STEM EDUCATION” The National Math and Science Initiative, March 25th, Available online at http://www.nms.org/Blog/TabId/58/PostId/237/supporting-our-girls-the-key-to-closing-the-gender-gap-in-stem-education.aspx, Accessed 7/8/15)

The American economy relies on the productivity, entrepreneurship, and creativity of all its people, yet women are being left behind in the critical fields of science, technology, engineering, and math. Supporting more women in STEM is the key, and NMSI is taking the steps to bridge this gap, but there is still much work to be done. To address and shed some new light on this pressing matter, STEMconnector and Tata Consultancy Services have issued a new white paper highlighting the vast disparities between men and women in the STEM world right now, as well as the opportunities that businesses, governments, and communities must seize in order to truly close the gender and achievement gaps and support more girls and women in STEM through education and mentorship. In Women in STEM: Realizing the Potential, Balaji Gunapathy and his eight white paper co-authors assert that within the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathrests “the key to the United States holding its position as the innovation and technology leader of the world,” as well as “the key to U.S. employment and prosperity.” This is because 80% of the fastest growing American jobs require a mastery and knowledge of math and science skills, and more than 1.2 million STEM positions are expected to be needed by 2018. However, as it stands right now, the U.S. won’t be able to fill a large portion of these STEM jobs – 230,000, to be exact – because we aren’t supporting a large portion of our workforce. Over 75% of STEM workers are men, while their female counterparts constitute less than 25%, despite the fact that nearly half of the U.S. workforce is comprised of women. “The gap between those numbers tells a story of squandered human potential,” states the report, and it is a story that begins in the classroom. According to co-authors Edie Fraser and Julie Kantor, “at a young age girls feel ‘pushed out’ of STEM classes when they are in the minority, or ‘pulled out’ by their peers.” As a result, women and other minority groups earn only 45% of undergraduate STEM degrees, yet they collectively represent roughly 70% of American college students – and the numbers become even more disheartening when they’re broken down further. The white paper reports that, out every 100 female bachelor students, only 12 earn a STEM degree, and only 3 persist in STEM fields 10 years after graduation. The number of computer science degrees awarded to women has also sharply declined, falling from 42% to 12% over the course of just 12 years, even though the field of computer science will constitute more than 70% of all STEM jobs by 2018. The U.S. economy needs more girls and women pursuing STEM degrees and careers, not just because of this vast gender gap, but because, in the words of the report, “innovation is critically dependent on diverse human experiences, and a diverse, STEM-trained workforce can be a significant competitive asset… to the U.S. as a whole.” How then, can we reverse this potentially damaging trend? According to the report, “it all begins in school.” Education is one of the top three focus areas the authors of the report highlight – along with inspiration and retention – that will help increase the number of women in STEM education and careers, and “mentorship plays a crucial role in all three.” As it stands right now, girls who are interested in STEM face a plethora of obstacles while in elementary and secondary school, ranging from weak STEM education programs, to underprepared or unqualified teachers, to popularized misconceptions about the aptitude of girls in the subjects of math in science – and all of this is compounded by the fact that the country as a whole is struggling to perform well in the subjects of math and science, with students ranking 30th and 23rd on the international spectrum, respectively. Our nation is very much embroiled in a STEM crisis, and this crisis will only intensify if we do not support women and empower them to be successful in the critical fields of math and science. It truly does begin in school, which is why NMSI is committed to supporting and enriching the STEM education programs in each and every one of our schools – and the fruits of our labor have proven its merits. Schools that have implemented our College Readiness Program (formerly known as NMSI’s Comprehensive AP Program) have seen an average first year increase of 72% in the number of passing AP scores in math, science, and English – that’s ten times the national average. In fact, NMSI’s School of the Year even saw an average first year increase of 137% in passing AP scores. The numbers are even more encouraging for our female students, who see an average increase of 87% in the number of passing AP math and science scores in the first year of our program, compared to the national increase of 8.7%. The white paper concludes with “a strong national call for mentors” for girls and women in STEM, and NMSI is answering this call by training more and more of America’s teachers so that they can serve as strong academic mentors for not only girls, but for all of our students. We are inspiring more students to pursue careers in STEM, and we’re helping teachers become better student mentors by giving them the support and resources they need to ensure student success. The only way our country is going to thrive in the knowledge economy of the future is if we start fostering, supporting, and nurturing student curiosity for STEM within our classrooms.

STEM Sector Key to U.S. Economic Competitiveness

Williams 13—Carol Williams is executive vice president of Dow Chemical Company’s manufacturing and engineering, supply chain, and environmental, health, and safety operations. (“America’s Economic Recovery Hinges on STEM Education” Techonomy, September 2nd, 2013, Available online at http://techonomy.com/2013/09/americas-economic-recovery-hinges-on-stem-education/, Accessed 7/8/15)

Of all of the potential threats to an economic recovery in the United States, one issue stands above the rest for companies like Dow. The issue isn’t tax reform. It isn’t energy prices. It’s not even budget issues in Washington. All of those are important. Perhaps the most important issue for us at Dow—the one that has the potential to either wreck or resurrect the American economy—is whether this country has enough qualified workers to sustain the economic recovery that we see looming just over the horizon. Here are the facts: After a decade of plant shutdowns and production shifts to other parts of the world, the American manufacturing landscape is once again competitive. Thanks largely to new energy resources, companies are once again investing in the U.S. Those investments are fueling massive potential job growth, especially in the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). The Department of Commerce reports that STEM occupations have grown three times as fast as non-STEM jobs over the past 10 years and that by 2018, the country will have 8.6 million STEM-related jobs to fill. So we’re excited about the potential economic growth and the potential for real job growth. But the lack of qualified workers threatens to derail this scenario. Projections show that by 2018, U.S. colleges and universities will have produced three million fewer college graduates than the labor market needs. And our secondary schools are producing only a fraction of students who pursue advanced STEM education opportunities. The result? By 2020, there could be as many as 12-24 million vacant STEM jobs globally as companies—and countries—compete for talent. Projections show that California by itself will need more than one million STEM-educated workers. New York will need nearly 500,000. And Michigan will need more than 250,000 new individuals who have the necessary technical training and background to sustain a real recovery. Even today a frenzied construction environment in Texas is fueling a 22-percent increase in STEM-related jobs for engineers, electricians, scientists, technologists, maintenance specialists, technicians, and other highly skilled manufacturing jobs. The fierce competition, even among individual companies, is unsustainable. Without qualified and skilled workers, the U.S. will lose its competitive advantage and a real, meaningful economic recovery will pass us by with devastating consequences. To correct this imbalance and help ensure an economic recovery, Dow believes the country should focus on four key areas. We should commit ourselves to improving teachers’ skills through mentoring and formal training. We should engage our students with hands-on learning as a model to build, support and grow the STEM pipeline. We should encourage creative partnerships and collaborations that support stronger curricula and better educational and trade facilities. And we should advocate on both the national and local levels for high-performing teachers and stronger, more effective STEM-based curricula. We recognize that if this were an easy problem to solve, the country would have done it years ago. The interplay of economic development, education and competitiveness is as complex as it is challenging. But it’s essential that we get it right. And it’s even more essential that we start now. By working together in collaborative efforts, by engaging with students early and often, by committing time and resources to support our teachers, and by continuing to push and advocate and educate all of our stakeholders, I’m confident we can not only make a difference but that we can make a lasting contribution to the economic vitality and sustainability of the American economy.

Lack of STEM workers creates serious economic issues for the U.S. ultimately leading to economic decline

Reese 13—Frederick Reese is lead staff writer for Mint Press specializing in race, poverty, congressional oversight and technology. An award winning data journalist and creative writer for over 15 years, Frederick has written about and worked for social advocacy projects and personal awareness efforts. Frederick is a jack-of-all-trades, with work experience as a teacher, a pastry chef and a story writer. Frederick has publication credits with Yahoo!, B. Couleur, and more. A native New Yorker, Frederick graduated from Colgate University in 1999 and Johnson & Wales University in 2003. Frederick started his journalistic career writing for his university’s newspaper, “The Colgate Maroon-News,” before starting and heading his own magazine, “The Idealist.” Most recently, Frederick received a data journalism award from the International Center for Journalists for his minimum wage coverage for MintPress. (“Drought Of STEM Graduates May Spell Doom For The American Economy” Mint Press News, September 24th, 2013, Available online at http://www.mintpressnews.com/drought-of-stem-graduates-may-spell-doom-for-the-american-economy/169535/, Accessed 7/8/15)

Higher education in the United States is in a state of crisis. On the obvious end of the conundrum is the student debt bubble — which at over $1 trillion in outstanding student loans and with a 90-day delinquency rate of over 11 percent — is showing signs of bursting any day. As reported by Reuters, JPMorgan Chase, in a move reminiscent of the banks’ posturing before the 2007 subprime mortgage collapse, has announced to the colleges that, as of October, it will stop issuing new private student loans. “We just don’t see this as a market that we can significantly grow,” said Thasunda Duckett, Chase’s student loans chief executive, to Reuters. The less obvious end, however, may be of greater concern. A recent study from the Council of Graduate Schools and the Graduate Records Examination Board showed that while international student enrollment in American graduate programs rose 8 percent to 10 percent of the total graduate population, from Fall 2011 to Fall 2012, domestic students enrollment only rose 0.6 percent over the same period. This is significant because roughly 55 percent of all international students enroll in natural science and engineering graduate programs in the United States, while only 17.3 percent of all American graduate program enrollees do likewise. Due to increasing international competition and a hostile immigration problem, some fear that America is in the midst of a “brain drain,” in which there are not enough science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM)-proficient professionals to meet the current and future demands. According to an analysis from Change the Equation, office and administrative support jobs face four unemployed persons per every job posting, management jobs face 2.2 unemployed persons per every job posting and business and financial jobs face 1.7 per every job posting. But 1.9 STEM job postings face every STEM-capable unemployed individual. The need is even more acute for healthcare jobs requiring STEM skills: 3.2 job postings are available to every STEM-capable unemployed job seeker. “Our data corroborate other evidence that STEM skills have been in high demand,” said Change the Equation. “For example, unemployment rates in STEM occupations have been historically low—generally lower than overall rates for workers with a bachelor’s or higher degree. And despite what skeptics claim, STEM workers command higher salaries, and that wage premium is rising, even when education level and other factors are taken into account. STEM workers with less than a bachelor’s degree earn 32 percent more than their non-STEM counterparts, up from 25 percent in 1994. Those with a bachelor’s degree earn 23 percent more, up from 18 percent over the same time period.” A dry well A recent study from the Council of Graduate Schools suggest, however, that the nation’s supply of STEM-ready postgraduates may be drying up. The 2013 increase in applications from prospective international students to American graduate schools was just one percent, compared to nine percent in 2012 and 11 percent in 2011. Off all institutions, 48 percent reported a decline in international applications, which was precipitated by a five-year decline in Chinese applications. “The overall slowed growth in international applications merits serious attention from policymakers as well as universities,” said CGS President Debra W. Stewart. “While the large increases in applications from India and Brazil are encouraging, the decrease in Chinese applicants needs attention. As a country, we simply can’t afford to maintain obstacles to international graduate study, especially as other countries are decreasing these barriers for highly qualified students.” The reality of this situation is a simple one: as the nation’s immigration system throws up an increasing battery of challenges against foreign doctoral holders from staying in the United States — including a recent call by Colorado and Washington state to institute higher fees on international students — other nations, such as Australia, Canada and the European Union nations are actively recruiting international students and are moving toward removing regulatory barriers. A 2012 bill, which would have made available 55,000 visas for foreign STEM graduate program enrollees, died in the Senate last December after congressional Democrats objected to the exclusion of diversity protections in the program. China, India and South Korea have all invested significant amount of capital into expanding their own domestic university system. New York University, Michigan State, Carnegie Mellon, Cornell, Georgetown, Northwestern, Texas A&M, George Mason and Bryn Mawr are among the American schools that currently or previously had foreign campuses. An increasingly xenophobic attitude in the United States has made the U.S. unattractive to foreign students, as well. Intelligence and the American economy This “brain drain” presents a real problem for the U.S. As reported by Forbes, 25 years ago, the United States was predicted to be in third place globally for gross domestic product, behind Japan and Germany. While the economists who made this prediction were right in predicting economic growth in Germany and Japan, they missed the United States’ growth by a factor of four. What the economists missed was the infusion of intellectual capital in America over the last 25 years — which brought the personal computer drive, the commercialization of the Internet, the miniaturization and personalization of electronics and the onset of small-scale entrepreneurship — and what effect that it would have on the world’s economy. Of the 1,000 or so key innovators, entrepreneurs and creative geniuses Gallup has listed as being the most influential to America’s economic growth in the last quarter-century, almost 60 percent were foreign-born. In light of a lack of available STEM-capable talent at home and internationally, the United States’ future seems grim. The U.S. Department of Labor estimates that while only 5 percent of the American workforce work in STEM jobs, they are responsible for more than 50 percent of the nation’s economic growth. Dissenting views This is a controversial statement, it turns out. According to an Economic Policy Institute paper, “Guestworkers in the High-Skill U.S. Labor Market: Analysis of Supply and Employment Trends of the IT Workforce,” only one of every two U.S. STEM graduates are employed in a STEM job. The report points out that there is actually less of a demand for STEM graduates, reflected by stagnant wages and by a large influx of guest-workers. The report also argues that the true reason Americans are not working STEM jobs is because most STEM jobs pay at a rate unsatisfactory to Americans — for STEM graduates not working in their field of study after one year, the leading rationale given, per the report, is “pay, promotion, working conditions.” “[If] there was an actual shortage of STEM workers, basic supply and demand would predict that the wages of STEM workers would be on the rise,” interprets the American Prospect. “Instead, wages in STEM fields have not budged in over a decade. Stagnant wages and low rates of STEM job placement strongly suggest we actually have an abundance of STEM-qualified workers.” Growing the next engineers This analysis, unfortunately, does not take into light that all STEM graduates do not move into STEM-careers by volition. Most jobs in the United States — from reporters to teachers, health care providers to the military to international finances — require STEM skills, and the incentive to go into research under a system of sequester cuts makes the drive to enter the private sector that much more alluring. The obvious solution to this problem is to get more Americans to graduate from STEM programs. This may not be as simple as it sounds. “For some time, it seemed like there were sufficient employment opportunities for graduates in a variety of other majors,” wrote Jim Treleaven for TBK blog. “Throughout most of the first decade of this century unemployment was relatively low and most college graduates had little difficulty in finding employment. That, of course, has changed recently but has not driven more students into STEM fields.” “One obvious problem is the difficulty of these majors. The course material is challenging and requires a significant aptitude in math,” Treleacan continued. “Perhaps more of an issue is the work load these majors demand. A recent study showed that the average engineer devoted twice as much time to their studies as other majors. Fully 40% of entering freshmen who intend on majoring in a STEM field switch majors.” Once a student is in college, it is too late to develop STEM skills. STEM, like a language, is best learned when a student is immersed in it at a young age. The solution to the nation’s “brain drain” begins, coincidentally enough, is the nation’s K-12 schools. An investment in childhood education toward a promotion of science and mathematics would be a logical first step, if the nation seeks to build a class of future scientists and engineers. Regardless of if one believes that there is a future drought of STEM-talent looming, the nation must grow serious about its obligations to its children and to the future. The nation can no longer hope for a stopgap solution from abroad; the nation must come up with its own solutions.

Economic decline causes war – studies prove

Royal 10 — Jedediah Royal, Director of Cooperative Threat Reduction at the U.S. Department of Defense, 2010 (“Economic Integration, Economic Signaling and the Problem of Economic Crises,” in Economics of War and Peace: Economic, Legal and Political Perspectives, ed. Goldsmith and Brauer, p. 213-215)

Less intuitive is how periods of economic decline may increase the likelihood of external conflict. Political science literature has contributed a moderate degree of attention to the impact of economic decline and the security and defence behaviour of interdependent stales. Research in this vein has been considered at systemic, dyadic and national levels. Several notable contributions follow. First, on the systemic level. Pollins (20081 advances Modclski and Thompson's (1996) work on leadership cycle theory, finding that rhythms in the global economy are associated with the rise and fall of a pre-eminent power and the often bloody transition from one pre-eminent leader to the next. As such, exogenous shocks such as economic crises could usher in a redistribution of relative power (see also Gilpin. 19SJ) that leads to uncertainty about power balances, increasing the risk of miscalculation (Fcaron. 1995). Alternatively, even a relatively certain redistribution of power could lead to a permissive environment for conflict as a rising power may seek to challenge a declining power (Werner. 1999). Separately. Pollins (1996) also shows that global economic cycles combined with parallel leadership cycles impact the likelihood of conflict among major, medium and small powers, although he suggests that the causes and connections between global economic conditions and security conditions remain unknown. Second, on a dyadic level. Copeland's (1996. 2000) theory of trade expectations suggests that 'future expectation of trade' is a significant variable in understanding economic conditions and security behaviour of states. He argues that interdependent states arc likely to gain pacific benefits from trade so long as they have an optimistic view of future trade relations. However, if the expectations of future trade decline, particularly for difficult to replace items such as energy resources, the likelihood for conflict increases, as states will be inclined to use force to gain access to those resources. Crises could potentially be the trigger for decreased trade expectations either on its own or because it triggers protectionist moves by interdependent states.4 Third, others have considered the link between economic decline and external armed conflict at a national level. Mom berg and Hess (2002) find a strong correlation between internal conflict and external conflict, particularly during periods of economic downturn. They write. The linkage, between internal and external conflict and prosperity are strong and mutually reinforcing. Economic conflict lends to spawn internal conflict, which in turn returns the favour. Moreover, the presence of a recession tends to amplify the extent to which international and external conflicts self-reinforce each other (Hlomhen? & Hess. 2(102. p. X9> Economic decline has also been linked with an increase in the likelihood of terrorism (Blombcrg. Hess. & Wee ra pan a, 2004). which has the capacity to spill across borders and lead to external tensions. Furthermore, crises generally reduce the popularity of a sitting government. "Diversionary theory" suggests that, when facing unpopularity arising from economic decline, sitting governments have increased incentives to fabricate external military conflicts to create a 'rally around the flag' effect. Wang (1996), DcRoucn (1995), and Blombcrg. Hess, and Thacker (2006) find supporting evidence showing that economic decline and use of force arc at least indirecti) correlated. Gelpi (1997). Miller (1999). and Kisangani and Pickering (2009) suggest that Ihe tendency towards diversionary tactics arc greater for democratic states than autocratic states, due to the fact that democratic leaders are generally more susceptible to being removed from office due to lack of domestic support. DeRouen (2000) has provided evidence showing that periods of weak economic performance in the United States, and thus weak Presidential popularity, are statistically linked lo an increase in the use of force. In summary, rcccni economic scholarship positively correlates economic integration with an increase in the frequency of economic crises, whereas political science scholarship links economic decline with external conflict al systemic, dyadic and national levels.' This implied connection between integration, crises and armed conflict has not featured prominently in the economic-security debate and deserves more attention.

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