Topic 6: Societal Challenges

Often, there is also a gap determined by income level, which means that a student may or may not receive training, or that it may or may not be of higher quality. In many places, especially in rural or under-resourced areas, they face a lack of quality STEM education because they do not have sufficient resources.

Despite significant advancement, biases persist in the STEM industry, which foster hostile conditions for minority racial and ethnic groups, individuals with disabilities, women, and other groups.

All students should acquire future-oriented skills in addition to the standard STEM subjects.

Industry credentialing is upending traditional educational paradigms in some sectors of the economy by displacing the requirement for diplomas with more competency-based abilities and credentials.

For more adults to continue working in the future workforce, they will need to upskill and retool.

In many STEM fields, not all groups have equal access to high-quality graduate education. At the graduate school level, there is diversity, but in some fields women, people with disabilities, and other groups are glaringly underrepresented. The majority of computer science and engineering doctorate students are from abroad and have temporary student visas.