OSTP's New STEM Guy Is Out Of Synch With Upper Management

Wieman had a 2nd career after his Nobel -- developing better approaches to science education.
Univ. of Colorado and Univ. of British Columbia.
As these links show, he's got great credentials in that area.

There's no question that NASA inspires students, and its educational materials are often "golden" in the classroom, but it's "unclear" whether NASA should have responsibilities in the classroom beyond that. Wieman evidently was answering that the bulk of the work belongs elsewhere.

It's premature to worry about whether Wieman will get sideways with his boss.

He sounds SANE. I'm sure he has no business in government.

I think Dr. Wieman's comments are consistent with the National Academies report.

What the report says is that what NASA does can be inspirational. But it says,
-the educational programs within NASA are very inconsistent and unstable owing in large measure to inconsistent and declining NASA education funding;
-NASA does not take advantage of current educational/communications processes and technology;
-programs are covered very inconsistently by the different mission directorates. Science MD got kudos for generally doing a good job as a part of every science projects budget is dedicated to education as an integral part of the mission; other directorates and programs, notably including some of the very expensive and better funded programs like Constellation, Shuttle and ISS have little focused K-12 educational efforts.
-NASA has no evaluation process in place to measure how well it is doing and it has no processes in place for improving how well it is doing in education.

Some of the more overriding comments are that NASA has a staff with expertise in science, technology and engineering but who have limited experience in education; but they have not tried to work with experts in education to develop effective education projects and methods. NASA does not review its education efforts in order to assess what it needs to do a better job.

The report also states that space and technology in general are not covered well in the nation's K-12 curriculum; this means that even if NASA is doing something worthwhile most students are unaware of it.

So in short, I think what Dr. Wieman has said is pretty accurate; what NASA does could be very inspirational if students knew what it was that NASA was doing.

Seems like Dr. Wiemann has his head screwed on straight. NASA contributes to education, but that's not what the agency is for.

The Summer of Innovation program is a nice educational endeavor for NASA. But really, we're talking "thousands of middle school teachers and students during multi-week programs in the summer of 2010". That compares to middle school science education over an entire school year across US that has to involve and engage millions of middle school students and teachers. What NASA is doing with SI is important as a precursor, or maybe validation of some activities for educational use, but the real job is not being done by NASA. Not even close. Obama and Bolden know this.

To the extent that education involves challenge and curiosity, NASA helps stimulate those things, for both kids and adults. But that's a piece of a much larger pie.

There are about 60 million students in grades K-12 in the US in about 125000 schools with about 7 million teachers.

Research appears to show that the time to capture a student's interest in a way that will ultimately effect his choice of a career is between ages 7 and 10, in the upper elementary grades.

So the way to interest students is as likely through current events, social studies and history subjects as it is through science.

If this is correct, then by later middle school and high school, most students will have already decided to go towards science, technology, engineering and math, or not, so NASA programs aimed at these students can encourage but likely will not sway a large number of 'converts'.

The key is to get the space program into the standardized curricula that have become so prevalent. In Texas, they've been putting together the final changes to new curriculum standards for the next decade over the last few weeks. Whether or not to include Neil Armstrong in the history texts was one of the questions brought up in the definition process. A new space sciences curricula goes into effect this year in the middle and high schools, and so far there is little approved textbook content developed for the subject.

From my perspective, I've not seen NASA offering a lot of content for the tens of millions of students who will become taxpayers in the next few years.

Geesh, Holdren's asteroid and golfballs thing sounds like a real snoozer.

A mentos and diet coke rocket would've been way more fun, even better inside of a good old fashioned plaster volcano (and timely too)!

Thinking of Holdren and his America to be mediocre statement (and Clinton's), the idea behind that might be something like how in the old days when girls were told to not act smart because the boys won't like them?

There was a time back when too, maybe the 70s, when the education fad from the "progressives" was that kids shouldn't be graded in school - that learning shouldn't be competitive - that they should just all be competing with themselves to do their very best, or something like that?

If so, then that plan would somehow involve holding back US NASA hsf from further advancement so it goes into that slide into mediocrity mode to facilitate other countries and/or commercial to catch up? And a side benefit, unmanned stuff gets to wallow in all the leftover bucks! Everybody wins - right?

"NASA contributes to education, but that's not what the agency is for."

I've heard this stated many times so no doubt yours is a widespread belief, but it is very incorrect.

The NASA Act states all of the following and a good deal more about formation of alliances with schools and universities; much of the NASA mission is supposed to be about education:

-provide for the widest practicable and appropriate dissemination of information concerning its activities and the results
-encourage, to the maximum extent possible, the fullest commercial use of space
-The expansion of human knowledge

-increase the understanding, assessment, development, and utilization of space
resources by promoting a strong educational base, responsive research and training activities, and broad and prompt dissemination of knowledge and techniques;
(2) utilize the abilities and talents of the universities of the Nation to support and
contribute to the exploration and development of the resources and opportunities afforded by the space environment;
(3) encourage and support the existence of interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary programs of space research within the university community of the Nation, to engage in integrated activities of training, research and public service, to have cooperative programs with industry, and to be coordinated with the overall program of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration;

GK, you got it right, and that is why I and a lot of other NASA engineers contribute their time and effort to going out to schools and trying to interest students in STEM. It may be poorly coordinated in many respects, but we do get to see tens of thousands of students every year and let them see what we do.

Yes, NASA inspires and contributes a unique perspective to education, but it's main job is to explore space. It's a matter of priorities and how much budget and effort is put into educational activities. It seems this Administration feels STEM is more important for NASA than actually conducting a human space exploration program. Nice to see that there may be someone at OSTP who has the priorities correct.

"NASA ...'s main job is to explore space"

Everything in the NASA Act is NASA's job. There are a lot of jobs besides exploring space. The first A, for instance,stands for Aeronautics.

You are correct, its a matter of prioritization, but the Weiman National Academy report seems to show a lot of missed opportunity and a lot of wasted effort.

And as we are seeing, if you do not reach the public, then the public won't be supporting. They won't even known whether or not to support, They wont know what to support.