Empire State STEM Education Progressive Dialogue

To date, the Dialogue has engaged over 500 stakeholders from business, PK-20 education, philanthropy, museums, public television, PTAs and school boards, professional associations in the STEM disciplines, teachers' unions, state and local government, and community-based organizations. They contributed over 2100 data points in 61 small group discussions and 10 plenary sessions conducted between June and December, 2009.

The Dialogue findings express a vision of STEM education that refers to the interdisciplinary teaching and learning of science, technology, engineering and mathematics, to a level of rigor sufficient to produce critical thinkers and problem solvers across all fields of endeavor. A rich portfolio of recommendations center on the needs of both teachers and students in growing STEM teaching and learning capacity; on acceleration of knowledge capture and sharing of effective policies, processes and programs; and on the stimulation of ongoing collaborative innovation through a multi-dimensional network of public-private partnerships. While actions are already underway that address some of the recommendations, others will require new or reallocated resources to gain traction.

We are hard at work on packaging the detailed findings for review and input from stakeholder communities; you will receive a draft in the near future. In the meantime, please refer to the attached overview presentation. We welcome your comments and suggestions.