Let’s take a brief look at global trends here.

 　The United States has been at the forefront of the STEM movement. The term “STEM” is said to have originated from the National Science Foundation (NSF), which was established shortly after World War II and has been working to enhance science education from an early stage.

Initially known as SMET, it garnered attention starting in the 1990s with the goal of raising the overall level of science literacy education, but the term was changed to STEM in 2001. Since the Obama administration, STEM has attracted even more attention.

 　In April 2009, shortly after President Obama took office, he emphasized the importance of STEM education in a speech at the National Academy of Sciences (The White House, 2016).This led to the launch of the “Education for Innovation” campaign. With a gross domestic product of $17 trillion, the United States reigns as an economic superpower, far outpacing the nations in second place and beyond. It is also a leader in science and technology, accounting for 43% of all Nobel Prize winners in the natural sciences.To continue leading the world as an economic and scientific powerhouse, the Obama administration prioritized strengthening STEM education as part of its innovation strategy.

　There are several reasons why the United States is promoting STEM education. First is the shortage of STEM talent.A survey by the U.S. Department of Education indicates that STEM-related occupations are projected to increase by 14% across all industries between 2010 and 2020. Based on these labor force projections and trends in the number of STEM degree recipients, it is estimated that there will be a shortage of one million STEM degree holders.

　Furthermore, in the 2012 OECD Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), the United States ranked near the bottom among the 33 OECD member countries, placing 27th in mathematical literacy and 20th in scientific literacy.

　In 2013, the country announced a five-year STEM education plan, setting specific goals such as training 100,000 high-quality STEM teachers for elementary and secondary education by 2020 and increasing the number of STEM college graduates by 1 million over the next 10 years, and has allocated an annual budget of $3 billion toward this effort.

　Furthermore, the STEM Education Act was enacted in 2015. It expanded the definition of STEM education and explicitly included computer science. The fact that computer science was officially included in the definition suggests the importance of computer science education. In addition, STEM education in community-based settings—such as museums and after-school programs—is also emphasized.

　 Since then, there has been growing discussion about integrating art and design into STEM education. In other words, the idea is to shift from STEM to STEAM. This trend was influenced by John Maeda, who served as Deputy Director of the MIT Media Lab and President of the Rhode Island School of Design, and who has been advocating for the shift “from STEM to STEAM” since 2013.

　The movement to make STEM education a national strategy has spread not only in the United States but around the world.

　The EU, too, has been working since the 1990s to raise the overall standard of science education across the EU. A STEM Action Plan was established with the aim of encouraging students to pursue STEM-related majors in college and to choose STEM-related careers.

　It established the EU STEM Coalition, a STEM platform within the EU, to facilitate the sharing of best practices in STEM education across member states and to support the development of member states’ STEM strategies through collaboration among industry, government, and academia.

　In 2004, the British government unveiled the “Investment Framework for Science and Innovation 2004–2014,” a 10-year plan that set forth specific goals for STEM education.This initiative was prompted by the “Roberts Review” (Robert, 2002), published in 2002. The report highlighted the decline in the number of students pursuing science and mathematics and analyzed the resulting challenges in education and the labor market.In a STEM program report prepared in 2006, the need for an organization to promote STEM was identified, and STEMNET was established as part of policy implementation. With the aim of fostering engagement in STEM education in collaboration with schools, STEMNET disseminates STEM-related information, supports the STEM Club Network, and appoints STEM ambassadors, thereby spearheading the nationwide promotion of STEM education.

　The trend is the same in Asia as well.

　Recognizing that the shortage of innovative talent and highly skilled professionals has become a bottleneck in China’s economic structural reform, the Ministry of Education first mentioned STEM education in 2015 and formally announced a policy to promote interdisciplinary learning (STEM education) in the “13th Five-Year Plan for Education Informatization” in 2016.In 2017, as part of the revision of the “Compulsory Education Elementary School Science Curriculum Standards,” it was decided to incorporate the practice of STEM education into the compulsory education curriculum. In Shanghai, interdisciplinary education that goes beyond STEM is referred to as “STEM+.” The city has established a “STEM+” Education Research Center and is reportedly working on a 10-year pilot research project.In Shenzhen, “maker education”—a form of STEM education focused on hands-on creation—is being implemented (Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, 2018). China has made the use of AI in education a national strategy.Dongwu Securities reportedly forecasts that the size of China’s STEM market will expand from the current approximately 9.6 billion yuan to 52 billion yuan in five years (ChinaNet, 2017).

　It is said that Singapore has placed a strong emphasis on science and math education since gaining independence in 1965. STEM education in Singapore is primarily promoted by the Science Center, the country’s largest science museum. In 2014, with the cooperation of the Singaporean government, the Science Center launched “STEM Inc.,” an organization dedicated to providing STEM programs to all middle school students.Furthermore, some elementary schools are reportedly beginning to introduce STEM education on a pilot basis. In Singapore, the “Thinking Schools, Learning Nation” initiative, proposed in 1997, aimed to shift the focus from knowledge-centered learning to the development of critical thinking skills, and inquiry-based learning has been promoted as a result.In STEM education as well, the emphasis is on experiential learning rather than subject-specific, siloed learning, and students are expected to learn within categories that reflect how these concepts are applied in society as a whole (Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, 2018).

　A common thread among the policies of all countries is the belief that STEM-related industries are closely linked to future international competitiveness and economic prosperity. There is also a shared recognition that it is important to cultivate STEM talent in anticipation of the growth of these industries.

What Is STEM/STEAM Education? Vol. 7: Conclusion
https://creativekids.jp/?p=18651
What Is STEM/STEAM Education? Vol. 6: The Current Situation in Japan
https://creativekids.jp/?p=18648
What Is STEM/STEAM Education? Vol. 5: The Current Global Situation
https://creativekids.jp/?p=18643
What Is STEM/STEAM Education? Vol. 4: STEM Education and Programming Education
https://creativekids.jp/?p=18640
What Is STEM/STEAM Education? Vol. 3: What Is STEM Education?
https://creativekids.jp/?p=18637
What Is STEM/STEAM Education? Vol. 2: STEM Literacy as a Fundamental General Education
https://creativekids.jp/?p=18633
What Is STEM/STEAM Education? Vol. 1: Social Change
https://creativekids.jp/?p=18628