Sec. 1. Short title; findings

1,015 words·~5 min read·/bill/115/hr/2653/ih/section-1

A research copy — for the controlling text, always check the official state or federal source. Not legal advice.

This Act may be cited as the . STEM Opportunities Act of 2017 The Congress finds the following: Many reports over the past decade have found that it is critical to our Nation’s economic leadership and global competitiveness that we educate and train more scientists and engineers. Research shows that women and minorities who are interested in STEM careers are disproportionately lost at nearly every educational transition. The National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics at the National Science Foundation collects, compiles, and publishes data on the demographics of STEM degrees and STEM jobs in the United States.

Women now earn nearly 37 percent of all STEM bachelor’s degrees, but major variations persist among fields. In 2015, women earned only 19 percent of all bachelor’s degrees awarded in engineering and 18 percent in computer sciences. Based on Bureau of Labor Statistics data, jobs in computing occupations are expected to account for nearly 2/3 of the projected annual growth of newly created STEM job openings from 2014 to 2024. In 2015, underrepresented minority groups comprised 39 percent of the college-age population of the United States, but only 17 percent of students earning bachelor’s degrees in STEM fields.

The Higher Education Research Institute at the University of California, Los Angeles, found that, while freshmen from underrepresented minority groups express an interest in pursuing a STEM undergraduate degree at the same rate as all other freshmen, only 22.1 percent of Latino students, 18.4 percent of African-American students, and 18.8 percent of Native American students studying in STEM fields complete their degree within 5 years, compared to approximately 33 percent and 42 percent 5-year completion rate for White and Asian students, respectively.

In some STEM fields, including the computer sciences, women persist at about the same rate through doctorate degrees. In other fields, including the physical sciences and mathematics, their numbers decrease by as much as 1 in 3. Overall, women earned 39 percent of STEM doctorate degrees in 2014. The number of minority students earning STEM doctorate degrees drops by nearly 40 percent. Students from underrepresented minority groups accounted for only 10.5 percent of STEM doctorate degrees awarded in 2014.

The representation of women in STEM drops significantly again at the faculty level. Overall, women hold only 23 percent of all tenured and tenure-track positions and 24 percent of full professor positions in STEM fields in our Nation’s universities and 4-year colleges. Black and Hispanic faculty together hold about 6.4 percent of all tenured and tenure-track positions and 7 percent of full professor positions. Many of the numbers in the American Indian or Alaskan Native and Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander categories for different faculty ranks were too small for the National Science Foundation to report publicly without potentially compromising confidential information about the individuals being surveyed.

The representation of women is especially low at our Nation’s top research universities. Even in the biological sciences, in which women now earn more than 50 percent of the doctorates and passed the 25 percent level 37 years ago, women make up only 25 percent of the full professors at the 100 or so most research-intensive universities. In the physical sciences and mathematics, they make up only 11 percent of these senior positions, in computer sciences only 10 percent, and across engineering fields only 7 percent.

The data suggest that approximately 6 percent of all tenure-track STEM faculty members at the most research intensive universities are from underrepresented minority groups, but in some fields the numbers are too small to report publicly. By 2050 underrepresented minorities will comprise 52 percent of the college-age population of the United States. If the percentage of female students and students from underrepresented minority groups earning bachelor’s degrees in STEM fields does not significantly increase, the United States will face an acute shortfall in the overall number of students who earn degrees in STEM fields just as United States companies are increasingly seeking students with those skills.

With this impending shortfall, the United States will almost certainly lose its competitive edge in the 21st century global economy. According to a recent Association for Women in Science survey of over 4,000 scientists across the globe, 70 percent of whom were men, STEM researchers face significant challenges in work-life integration. Researchers in the United States were among the most likely to experience a conflict between work and their personal life at least weekly. One-third of researchers surveyed said that ensuring good work-life integration has negatively impacted their careers, and, of researchers intending to leave their current job within the next year, 9 percent indicated it was because they were unable to balance work and life demands.

Female students and students from underrepresented minority groups at institutions of higher education who see few others ‘‘like themselves’’ among faculty and student populations often do not experience the social integration that is necessary for success in all disciplines, including STEM. A substantial body of evidence establishes that most people hold implicit biases. Decades of cognitive psychology research reveal that most people carry prejudices of which they are unaware but that nonetheless play a large role in evaluations of people and their work.

Unintentional biases and outmoded institutional structures are hindering the access and advancement of women and minorities in science and engineering. Workshops held to educate faculty about unintentional biases have demonstrated success in raising awareness of such biases. In 2012 the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s Office of Diversity and Equal Opportunity completed a report specifically designed to help NASA grant recipients identify why the dearth of women in STEM fields continues and to ensure that it is not due to discrimination.

The report provides guidance to institutions of higher education on how to conduct meaningful self-evaluations of campus culture and policies. This report and its guidance are equally applicable to all institutions of higher education receiving significant Federal research funding. The Federal Government provides over 60 percent of research funding at institutions of higher education and, through its grant-making policies, has had significant influence on institution of higher education policies, including policies related to institutional culture and structure.