Why STEM is not enough

There was an interesting opinion piece on the Washington Post web site yesterday... several scholars arguing that science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) education is "not enough."

While I agree with the point-- we cannot focus exclusively on STEM education-- this article does contribute to the "science versus humanities" debate. What matters as we think about helping students develop the "21st century skills"they will need is the creativity and flexible thinking that results in independent thinking no matter the field of inquiry.

The scientist who lacks creativity is doomed to study irrelevant questions and to make little contribution... the scholar in the humanities who does not approach his or her work systematically as the scientists does, is doomed to create little of merit.

Whenever I read such debates, I think of John Ratey's Spark and the observation he made that fit bodies support fit brains, and the seemingly oxymoronic conclusion that test scores can be raised by increasing physical education.