On Tuesday, the Trump administration released a five-year strategic plan for expanding science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education. In the report, the administration calls for providing all Americans with “lifelong access to high-quality STEM education” and for the United States to be a global leader in STEM.
To achieve the vision outlined in the report, the administration presented three goals:
- Ensure that every American has the opportunity master basic STEM concepts and become digitally literate;
- Increase diversity, equity, and inclusion in STEM fields, especially among women and racial minorities;
- Create learning experiences that encourage and prepare students to pursue STEM careers.
The plan makes a series of recommendations on how federal agencies, nonprofits, schools, and businesses can promote STEM education. For instance, it encourages educators to make STEM learning “more meaningful and inspiring to students by focusing on complex real-world problems and challenges that require initiative and creativity.”
The America COMPETES Reauthorization Act of 2010 is the legislation responsible for generating this report. The act created the national Committee on STEM Education (CoSTEM), which coordinates with other federal agencies to develop and implement a STEM education strategic plan, to be updated every five years. The last published strategic plan was released in 2013 by the Obama administration. The complete report can be accessed here.
