Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 1665, the Building Blocks of STEM Act, which supports STEM education research focused on early childhood education. There is a lot of discussion about the gender disparity in the STEM workforce and the leaky pipeline that widens the gap as women and girls continue through school. Although women make up half of the U.S. workforce, they make up less than a quarter of those employed in STEM occupations. The Building Blocks of STEM Act addresses these disparities by ensuring an equitable distribution of STEM education research funding for projects focused on young children and helping us understand why girls are encouraged or discouraged from participating in STEM activities. It also ensures that the National Science Foundation grants are awarded to entities that are working in partnership, such as research universities with local education agencies, to increase participation in computer science education. Computer science is particularly struggling to recruit and retain women, who make up less than 18 percent of the computer science workforce. The number is trending down, not up. {time} 1415 This has a ripple effect on our country's ability to fill the high- skilled jobs of today and tomorrow. We need the next generation of young women to pursue STEM degrees, and we are not seeing the numbers we need.…”