Your support needed for increasing minorities and women in science and engineering

Yesterday, Tom Friedman's column, "Can’t Keep a Bad Idea Down", in the New York Times.com referred to our " dysfunctional political system ...that knows the right answers but can’t even discuss them rationally, let alone act on them, and one that devotes vastly more attention to cable TV preachers than to recommendations by its best scientists and engineers." I am working on an article about a group of black scientists and engineers who organized to get Bell Laboratories to fund advanced graduate degrees for almost 600 minority and women scientists and engineers, for almost 40 years. This group includes two people who are in the National Inventors Hall of Fame, the first female and black Dean of Harvard College, the co-founder of Silicon Graphics which provides special effects for major Hollywood movies, and many others. Producing more African-American, Latino, American Indian, and women scientists and engineers is critical to creating good jobs in these communities. More diversity in science, engineering and technology is needed to maintain America's lead in the increasingly innovation driven global economy. 

Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/27/opinion/27friedman.html?_r=1&src=me&ref=homepage (sent via Shareaholic)

Posted via email from Brian's posterous