Have we done the math on our math and science deficits?

One part of current thinking about American school reform is seemingly simple math, so much so that we see the need to discuss it about as often as we discuss the logic of 2 + 2 =4.

Here it is: We don’t do well in science and math. We don’t do well in science in math because we don’t have enough quality science and math teachers. Without a strong showing in math and science the country will fall behind its competitors in all areas including, perhaps, national security. Therefore, we need to adjust our administrative apparatus – including school funding mechanisms – so that we, first, increase the number of students taking degrees in math and science and, second, encourage more of them, in turn, to become teachers.

Let’s assume this is true (and most currently do) in order to complete the equation. If the math is correct, our interpretation of the equation result is also simple: to make the numbers come out differently than they already are we need to change the schools, mainly by leaning toward privatization which, as we all know, is much more effective using its resources than the public sector.

Simple enough. Problem solved, as Ross Perot used to say.

But is it possible our own math deficiency is causing us to misread the numbers, to skew the problem long before we get to the solution?

There is, at least, a built in paradox here that should give us pause: if nobody knows math in this country how do we know we don’t know math? Who is doing the calculations?

It might be useful, I think, when talking about our failure in math and science, a failure of public education tout court, we look at some numbers (other than, for example, MEAP scores). MEAP scores, as far as well can tell, tell us about, well, MEAP scores.

Here are some other numbers, then, to ponder.

According to the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics, the US – whose universities are still the most sought after on the planet despite the supposed massive failure of public education – produced 17.2 million degrees (not counting Phds, those that work in universities, some of them public, that both take and generate funds for public universities in part through public funding sources like the National Science Foundation and National Institute of Health -- stereotypically, these are the scientists most think of when they think of scientists) in math and science fields. This is in a country of some 314 million, give or take.

Of those 17.2 million degrees in math and science – as of 2008 – 2.6 million were not in the labor force. That is, they weren’t out of work nor were they seeking work. For some perspective: at about 3 million, teachers constitute the largest labor force in the country (one reason they are so in need of management and reform). 4.8 million had jobs that related to their degree, among them a few teachers. Only 490,000 were unemployed. This is a remarkably low number, I should say, for those seeking a university major with an eye exclusively towards employment -- what Governor Snyder seems to like to call "career readiness," what many used to understand as "job training."

But here is the interesting number for school reformers who are convinced our schools need to change completely, absolutely, entirely because of abysmal waste and mismanagement. 9.9 million of those with science and math degrees hold jobs  not in their field. That is, they had careers doing something else under than the math and the science that is, presumably, according to our current understanding of school reform math, going to keep America great.

I will provide a little shorthand here. Less than 40% of our math and science degree holders do (in any practical sense) math and science.

Getting accurate data on such large numbers is tricky so the National Center for Science and Engineering hesitates in explaining exactly what these folks are doing. Many, it seems, work in layers of corporate administration that supervise others who, presumably, can’t do math and science as well as their supervisors.

The latter supposition, of course, is mine, not the National Center’s (before I encourage any vote to defund the National Center). Like institutions of its sort it tends to be much more circumspect than bloggers, politicos, etc.

But as a citizen concerned like we all are with America’s greatness, my thought after looking at these numbers is this: if America does have a math and science deficit, university degree production does not show it. And in this equation, it isn’t schools that are bottling up or not yielding opportunities for math and science to bloom as they supposedly did, say, in the 1950s or 1960s.

There is a missing part of the equation somewhere.