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Amidst the myriad opinion pieces that are posted daily on the Internet, a few gems stand out and deserve much wider mention. Such is the case with an op-ed piece, "America Must Invest More Human Capital in Scientific, Technical Fields," published last fall by Dr. Jerome Grossman on the Web site of the National Academies.

In the article, Dr. Grossman, a member of the Government University Industry Research Roundtable (GUIRR), writes: "As the country struggles to contain terrorism and strengthen the economy, there's a growing awareness that these campaigns rely largely on a dangerously scarce resource: U.S. scientists and engineers. The shortage of technical and scientific human capital is a complex, deep-rooted problem. Fixing it calls for making major changes in schools and universities, not to mention drawing more women and minorities into the top echelon of technical fields, where they are severely underrepresented. The challenges are abundantly clear." Dr. Grossman goes on to offer some critical views of our current educational system. I recommend his piece to your reading.

The GUIRR regularly assesses the adequacy of the U.S. science and engineering workforce of the future. What they've concluded is most alarming. As documented by the National Science Board's Science and Engineering Indicators, 2002, students are not attracted to careers in science and engineering as they once were, and graduation rates at U.S. universities are not keeping pace with the demand for skills in science, engineering, mathematics and technology. One statistic stands out in particular: Every year for the past five years there have been more undergraduates in this country receiving degrees in parks and recreation than in electrical and electronics engineering.

Our nation's looming shortage of skilled scientists and engineers is a matter that should deeply concern Government Executive readers. This is truly a national issue, and the federal government is obligated to take a leadership role in addressing it. A few years ago, when I was teaching at the Syracuse University Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, the Navy secretary asked me to lead a study to examine the future manpower needs of the service. The latest trends in the production of U.S. scientists and engineers force me to stand back and look at the situation from a national perspective. It is not enough for the Navy or NASA or any other federal agency to have an adequate number of the "best and brightest." All of us must work to dramatically expand our talent pools.

NASA intends to do its part to fix the situation that Dr. Grossman has described. NASA's mission statement includes the following objective: "To inspire the next generation of explorers - as only NASA can." We take this challenge very seriously, and have accordingly made efforts to enhance American science and math education a core NASA mission. Our renewed focus on education involves inspiring American youth through our exciting aeronautics and space research and exploration activities, and providing educators with the tools they need to teach math and science and improve the country's scientific literacy. In addition, we are enthusiastic about teaming up on education-related projects with the Education Department, and many other organizations within the federal government that are equally committed to helping to advance American educational achievement.

Further, as an agency that depends on a world-class workforce to break new ground in science and technology, explore the universe and help improve life here on Earth, NASA recognizes that we must do a better job of recruiting and retaining promising young scientific talent. After experiencing limited hiring opportunities during the downsizing of the last decade, NASA today faces some truly daunting human capital challenges in terms of significant skill gaps and lack of depth in critical competencies among our workforce. Correcting these skills imbalances is more difficult than it would have been in the past due to competition from the private sector for the shrinking pool of talented young scientists and engineers.

This situation will only worsen in the coming years as the baby boom generation retires and employers become more aggressive in filling the vacancies created by those retirements. Our recruitment efforts will continue to strive to create a workforce representative of the nation's diversity, but we must acknowledge the difficulties in this task, because today's science and engineering labor pool lacks diversity.

To address these issues, NASA has developed a strategic human capital plan to ensure that we have an effective, integrated, systematic, agencywide approach to human capital management. We are aggressively using the many authorities that allow agencies to recruit, retain, train and develop their workforce. We are also taking advantage of technology and the Internet to streamline our recruiting process.

These efforts would be significantly enhanced by the expansion of existing authorization to emulate best federal practices. Accordingly, we have developed legislative proposals that would provide NASA with new authorities, tools and strategies to improve worker recruitment and retention, and to upgrade the competency and flexibility of our workforce.

These include streamlined hiring authorities that will enable job offers to be made more quickly; more flexible financial incentives that will allow us to compete more successfully with the private sector in attracting and retaining a world-class workforce; and a scholarship-for-service program that would offer college scholarships to students pursuing degrees in science, engineering, mathematics or technology in exchange for a service requirement with NASA after graduation.

Thanks to the active leadership of Kay Coles James and the Office of Personnel Management that she heads, the Bush administration has endorsed and advanced these initiatives to Congress. We hope that legislators will be able to address these proposals in the 108th Congress. The sooner we can put the tools needed to comprehensively address this situation in place the better. It would be an unfortunate loss of time to let this opportunity pass us by. And based on current retirement trends, the challenge could become a crisis within this decade.

Clearly, my concerns and those expressed by Dr. Grossman and the GUIRR are not new ones. Indeed, it is worth noting that in their 1999 report, the U.S. Commission on National Security for the 21st Century - the Hart-Rudman Commission - had some prescient things to say about our looming shortage of skilled scientists and engineers in addition to their now-famous warnings about domestic terrorism.

The commission stated, "The harsh fact is that the U.S. need for the highest quality human capital in science, mathematics and engineering is not being met. Given the requirements of advanced 21st century economies, it is not good enough that we produce a sufficient elite corps of science, math and engineering professionals. We must raise levels of math, science and technology literacy throughout society." Just last fall, the Commission on the Future of the United States Aerospace Industry reached the same conclusion.

Three years after the Hart-Rudman report was issued, recent data shows a four percent annual decline in the production of physical scientists and engineers. To those readers who think this figure doesn't sound all that bad, I'm reminded by my pilot friends that airlines approach their landing strips at a two and a half degree glide slope, and that a four degree glide slope would look very steep indeed. I believe we need to check that rate of descent and initiate a climb rate to meet future national demands.

Fortunately, federal agencies are beginning to respond to this complex challenge with the same can-do spirit that has characterized past American responses to clearly identified crisis. With a greater spirit of interagency cooperation and resolve we can see this mission through to a successful conclusion.

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