Thought
Pieces
A thought piece by Spence M. (Sam) Armstrong; NASA HQ
This memo covers the minutes of the luncheon held on Jan. 29 at
the GUIRR. Although I have authored this memo, I have cleared it
with my co-collaboratorsDan Hastings of MIT and Dan Sullivan
of Qualcomm.
Note the name that I am suggesting in the address for our group.
It is lengthy but descriptive. We havent fallen in love with
the name yet so there is time for the members to come up on the
net and suggest, endorse or acquiesce.
By all accounts, the luncheon was productive beyond most of our
expectations. From the minutes you can discern there was agreement
that something should be done and a good start was the sharing of
"what works". A real breakthrough came when Dan Sullivan
suggested, seconded by Bob Spitzer, that we narrow our focus to
decrease the existing dropout rate of undergraduate science and
engineering majors. If this can be done, this is the quickest way
to increase the talent pool for the nation.
I asked that each participant provide me with two two-page summaries
of "what works" programs that they were administrating.
Further, that one of these should address the narrowed focus described
above. I also asked that the programs be described along the format
of the CAHSEE program that I distributed to the attendees. It was
agreed to by those in attendance and I committed to personally contacting
those invitees who were not in attendance. I am now asking that
I receive those two-pagers via email no later than February 22 with
copies to Dan Hastings and Dan Sullivan and an info copy to Nina.
I will chat with the two Dans and probably schedule a conference
call through GUIRR for a discussion of what I should present at
the March 13 GUIRR meeting in the 20 minutes that I have been allotted
on the agenda.
Do any of you have any pertinent data on the aforementioned dropout
rates. My only source covers only women and minorities.
By the way, in stumbling around on the web I came across Project
Kaleidoscope (www.pkal.org)
which has been working for some years with similar concerns as our
newly formed coalition. It looks like we might join forces in some
way. I have contacted the Executive Director here in DC and we will
meet in a couple of weeks when her schedule permits. Ill keep
you posted.
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