Via EurekAlert, a press release regarding a speech by former Presidential Science Advisor (under Bill Clinton) Neal Lane, about nanotechnology. Lane apparently warned that the US is in danger of falling behind in nanotechnology, and urged steps to avoid a nano gap, including the following slightly puzzling paragraph:
A “second step critical to the success of nanotechnology is to infuse nanotechnology education into the curriculum in every school and teacher education program.” Dr. Lane highlighted the huge investment the U.S. made to science and engineering education almost fifty years ago when Russia launched Sputnik–the world’s first artificial satellite. He stressed that America’s “children and workforce need that same level of national commitment to lead and keep them competitive in the Nano Age.”
I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m all in favor of a Sputnik-level investment in science and engineering education. By all means, let’s put some serious bucks into improving the state of science in the US.
But what does “infuse nanotechnology education into the curriculum in every school and teacher education program” even mean?
I have no idea, and that type of rhetoric has been annoying me for years. I mean, Christ, have we “infused transistor education into the curriculum in every school and teacher education program?”
Well… no. Not as far as I can see, except to the extent that it’s covered in modern history classes, science classes in maybe high school, and in the use of whatever tools the microelectronics revolution has developed for aid in teaching. I’d be pretty thrilled if we infused mathematics education into the curriculum, myself.
(And don’t blame that one on Drexler. While Drexler’s got his own very large issues, that vein of rhetoric comes from the subgroup that Drexler accuses of hijacking his little revolution.)
Nanoparticles in the cafeteria lunches?
Maybe they could make Neal Stephenson’s The Diamond Age required reading?
For starters, probably nanoscale science and engineering degrees, which require a lot of things from engineering that undergrad physics people don’t get and a lot of things from chemistry and physics that engineering students don’t get.
Aside from that, perhaps you should email Dr. Lane and ask, cause the teacher prep part is quite cryptic, and unclear as to how it would differ from plain old fixing-math-and-science-in-the-schools.
He needs a better name. A “nano gap” doesn’t sound very serious.