STEM educators fear spending bill undermines goal of new U.S. law
By Devi Shastri
A federal grant has helped 500 teachers in Tampa, Florida, discover new ways to teach science at every grade level. The knowledge they’ve gained over the past 3 years has translated into 24 new lessons and a curriculum that includes hands-on strategies such as engineering design challenges.
But the fate of that and dozens of other federally funded programs to improve STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) education in U.S. elementary and secondary schools is up in the air following the first move by Congress to fund a new education law that reshuffles money allocated for STEM activities. A 2017 spending bill approved earlier this month by the Senate appropriations committee falls well short of what STEM educators had expected, setting off a potentially zero-sum game between science and other parts of the curriculum.