Are we producing too few or too many science and technology grads?

Public domain, via penbentley on Flickr

Earlier this week, the New York Academy of Sciences released a new report that focuses on what it terms the STEM paradox. STEM stands for science, technology, engineering, and math, and it's generally used to describe high-tech and research-oriented education and careers. If you talk to people looking for jobs in academia, you'll typically hear that we produce too many STEM graduates, leaving many struggling to find jobs. If you talk to people who represent companies like Google and Microsoft, we produce too few, and need to relax visa restrictions in order to bring in more from overseas.

This strange situation—a simultaneous glut and shortage—is what the NYAS report calls the "STEM paradox." Both problems are real, and they're the result of mismatched priorities. As Jeanne Dunn, vice president of Learning@Cisco put it when the report was introduced, when it comes to STEM graduates, "there's a huge imbalance of talent—where they are and the types of things they are skilled in."

So, even though our graduate schools may be producing highly qualified researchers, the research they're prepared for is often only appropriate in an academic setting; commercial entities end up looking for a different set of skills. Industry also ends up looking for more people at early stages of their careers—the bachelors and masters levels—but only if they have a relevant skill set. For the most part, undergraduate educations don't provide those. The result of these is part of the imbalance that Dunn mentioned.