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Engineering Education for Innovation Act (E2)
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Click to download a PDF
of the draft E2 Bill text. |
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IEEE-USA Wants to
Teach Engineering
in Your Kid’s Public School
Well, not us
personally. But we do want to help your states and local
communities add engineering design concepts and problem
solving skills to its public school science and math
education programs.
Towards this end, IEEE-USA has joined with a broad coalition of engineering,
science, educational, and business groups to support the
Engineering Education for Innovation ACT, or the E2 Bill.
The E2 Bill (S. 3043 & HR. 4709) will
provide federal grants to enable states to add engineering
to their public school curricula. The bill creates two
grants programs: one to develop the curricula and a second
to put the curricula into practice. The first planning grant
cannot exceed $1 million over two years. The second
implementation grant would be for not less than $10 million
over four years. The bill also provides for $5 million for
evaluative research to help determine which programs do and
do not work. Overall the E2 Bill would cost less than $142.5
million over six years.
States would have to
compete for the implementation grants based on criteria set
forth in the bill. These criteria would include:
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The quality of their
plan, developed with the planning grant
- Percentage of
students from underprivileged backgrounds who would be
served by the plan, and
- An agreement that
the state provide matching funds to cover a portion of
the costs
Participation in the
program would be entirely voluntary. States that do not want
to meet the conditions of the bill can simply choose not to
submit applications.
The bill also gives states wide latitude in using the grants,
allowing states to experiment and adapt their plans to their
unique needs. For example, states can use the implementation
grants to set academic standards, create distance learning
modules for students or teachers, build on-line learning
tools, buy equipment, assess their program, train or recruit
teachers and even fund after school programs focused on
engineering.
As most American IEEE members know, the United States
generally does not expose our students to engineering in
public school at all. This is a serious weakness in our
educational system, given the important role engineering
plays in our economy.
Worse, many communities in the United States produce few
engineers. Because there are no engineers to expose students
to engineering outside of school, children in these
communities have little chance to learn about the field in
time to acquire the skills needed to enter it. The E2 Bill
would help break this cycle by exposing more students to
engineering at an early age, soon enough so that they can
prepare to pursue higher
education and a career in the field.
The E2 Bill was introduced by the following legislators:
- Sen. Kristen Gillibrand (D-NY)
- Sen. Ted Kaufman (D-NJ)
- Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-ME)
- Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA)
- Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA)
- Rep. Paul Tonko (D-NY-21)
- Rep. Phil Hare (D-IL-17)
- Rep. Daniel Lipinski (D-IL-3)
Key Benefits of the E2
Bill:
- Increased technological literacy across the American
public
- Greater student interest and success in math and sciences
- Broader awareness of and interest in engineering
- Increased competency in engineering design and problem
solving
- Wider exposure to engineering among underprivileged
students
The bill is broadly popular in Congress,
but because of the crowded
legislative calendar, many beneficial bills will fail to
pass simply because Congress will not get to formally
consider them. Engineers who support the E2 Bill will have
to be vocal in that support in order for Congress to act on
this modest, but potentially very important, educational
reform bill.
Resources
Leadership for this initiative, and much of the original
thinking behind it, is provided by the Boston Museum of
Science’s National Center for Technological Literacy
(www.mos.org/nctl/)
Updated:
18 May 2010
Contact: IEEE-USA GR
Webmaster
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