Today, I submitted a response to the Department of War's request for information for its top-tier STEM talent strategy. I offered the following recommendations: 1) Implement best practices identified by federally funded education R&D, such as universal screening, automatic enrollment, acceleration, and differentiation/grouping, 2) Establish a DoW STEM young scholars program, and 3) Establish a STEM enrichment account program for DoWEA students.
The Department of War has identified a clear mission for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics education “to inspire, attract, and develop the Nation’s top STEM talent pool to advance defense superiority, maintain global technological leadership, and bolster economic strength.” Strengthening STEM education within DoW, and in particular the Department of War Education Activity (DoWEA), would yield significant benefits for the nation’s security and innovation. In addition, DoWEA has an opportunity to play a leadership role for the rest of the nation and its elementary and secondary education systems. Establishing an American model for developing top STEM talent could help reverse a multi-decade, national trend of widespread neglect of the nation’s brightest elementary and secondary students.
The Department of War is well positioned to be that model. In fact, its K-12 schools already are a national model of excellence. Operating 160 schools serving 60,000 students across 11 foreign countries, seven states, and in two territories, DoWEA is one of the top performing school systems serving American students. DoWEA schools routinely show the highest student achievement levels on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, the “Nation’s Report Card.” But DoWEA could go further to promote advanced education and become the national model for identifying and training the nation’s STEM students.
The Foundation for American Innovation is a nonprofit organization that champions the technology, talent, and ideas essential to American prosperity, security, and flourishing. Our science and innovation program focuses on advancing a new national agenda to ensure that the United States remains the international leader in advanced science and innovation in part by winning the talent race in K-12 and postsecondary education. FAI’s work is largely focused on research, analysis, and developing recommendations for American policymakers. We do not manage or run STEM education programs. Therefore, we will offer our response to the following RFI question:
Is there any additional information that you would like to share about your organization's capabilities or peer programs/organizations and efforts you are aware of that could help the Department better understand how to identify, accelerate, and enrich top STEM talent? Briefly describe these efforts or programs.
FAI has reviewed research evidence and interviewed top academics to identify promising strategies and interventions that could be used to help the Department better identify, accelerate, and enrich top STEM talent. We have also reviewed other current and past education interventions that could provide models for DoD’s STEM initiative. Based on this work, we recommend the following to identify, accelerate, and enrich top STEM talent:
1. Implement best practices identified by federally funded education R&D, such as universal screening, automatic enrollment, acceleration, and differentiation/grouping.
DoWEA could leverage existing federally funded education research and development that has already identified best practices for identifying, accelerating, and enriching top STEM talent. For example, the National Research Center on Advanced Education at Johns Hopkins University, led by professor Jonathan Plucker, conducts research and promotes policy development to support “high-aptitude learners in schools nationwide.” In a 2020 article for the Fordham Institute, Plucker summarized how substantial empirical research shows positive benefits associated with certain advanced-learning interventions, such as acceleration and grouping students based on ability. He also explained that there is reason to believe that enrichment programs, such as summer learning offerings, benefit advanced learners. More recently, Plucker and his colleagues have highlighted the promising potential of auto-matic enrollment policies, which have been implemented in North Carolina. This intervention involves automatically placing students in advanced courses if they perform at an advanced level during the previous school year. This commonsense reform, which one might already assume to be standard policy in most schools, has not yet been evaluated for its academic effects. But Plucker and his colleagues reason that it is promising.
In addition, some federally funded research interventions could provide classroom models that could be implemented today in DoWEA schools. For example, researchers at the National Center for Research on Gifted Education at the University of Connecticut are currently implementing an initiative, Project BUMP UP, in classrooms across the United States. This intervention combines pre-testing, differentiation, and accelerated learning opportunities in elementary mathematics. The researchers found that students benefited from the opportunities to learn new mathematics content each week and that “more students met and/or exceeded proficiency in BUMP UP classroom than comparison classrooms.”
Beyond these promising interventions identified by federally funded education research centers, the Department or DoWEA could consult with the Department of Education (including the Institute of Education Sciences) and the National Science Foundation to solicit recommendations for specific interventions funded through federally-funded R&D focused on strengthening STEM education.
2. Establish a DoW STEM Young Scholars Program
In addition to improving better classroom interventions, the Department should consider other initiatives to provide enrichment outside of the traditional school setting. For example, DoW could establish a program that identifies and provides summer enrichment opportunities for talented STEM students. This has already been done in the past. In the 1980s, the National Science Foundation launched the Young Scholars Program in 1988, using $3.7 million in funding to create enrichment programs in science, engineering, and mathematics for talented students in grades 7 through 12 outside school and during the summer. The program provided firsthand learning opportunities for talented students to learn from top STEM experts in research centers. While this program ended in the 1990s, it provides a potential model for today. DoW could establish a new Young Scholars Program, either focused on DoWEA students or for a broader population of students, by offering high-performing K-12 students opportunities to learn from top STEM experts within the DoW. For example, military service academies could host students and provide an opportunity for students to accelerate their STEM learning and establish relationships with STEM professors and practitioners. Defense industrial base partners could also host students or provide instructional programming.
3. Establish a STEM Enrichment Account Program for DoWEA Students
Another promising strategy to provide an outside-of-school enrichment would be to establish a “STEM Enrichment Account Program,” modeled after state-based education savings account (ESA) programs. These ESA programs allow students to use a share of public school funding to purchase education services, such as tutoring, from certain education providers. A DoWEA STEM Enrichment Account program could involve providing students with a $2,000 account to access tutoring and summer enrichment services in STEM. These services could include online learning programs that would allow students in remote locations to access advanced coursework. Such an initiative could potentially be funded through the new federal education tax credit program or by repurposing other DoW funding.
