In my February 10th blog I mentioned that there is a growing concern among U.S. academia, government, and private industry that the pool of "home grown" math and science practitioners is shrinking. This shrinking pool many argue threatens the United States´ ability to compete in the global economy.
While there are numerous grass roots initiatives focused on reversing this trend, the nonprofit FIRST (For the Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) founded by Dean Kamen - inventor of the Segway scooter among other things - is one that gets to the core of where the challenge lies....and that is.... getting more middle and high school students interested (aka jazzed up, excited) in making science and technology their career focus.
This past weekend FIRST sponsored a Robotics competition with high schools teams from around the country to do just that....get kids excited about science and technology. Corporations sponsored teams and contributed funds for parts, tools, and fees. NASA even set up a machine shop to help with last minute adjustments.
Without the home grown pool of highly energized and bright math and science wizards, the US will forever be preoccupied by the political, social, and economics challenges of the current guest worker programs. Finding the solution to the shortage is found further upstream when the students are most curious.
So what is the connection to Employment Branding you ask? The brightest students follow the brightest opportunity. The next time you put together a recruitment budget think about sponsoring a FIRST Robot team or a science fair....because at the other end of these artificial intelligence pieces are incredibly intelligent students who just might some day be your next star performer.
