Category Archives: Career

Information on jobs and careers in science and engineering.

Mexican Engineering Brain Drain

Network to curb Mexican brain drain by Kathleen Miller

Mexico hopes its nascent high-tech sector can create good jobs and help diversify the economy at a time when rising wages for low-skill labor are driving textile and assembly factories to poorer nations in Asia and Central America.
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A recent analysis by Mexican and U.S. immigration experts found that nearly a third of all Mexicans with advanced degrees leave Mexico for the U.S.
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Camacho, who heads the program’s pioneering Silicon Valley chapter, says the idea arose during a 2004 meeting between Mexican President Vicente Fox and the chief executive of major chipmaker Advanced Micro Devices Inc., Hector Ruiz, who was born in Mexico but studied engineering in the United States and went on to build a career there.

Mexico’s government has sponsored conferences for the network, but Camacho says the group is growing more by word of mouth. His Silicon Valley chapter holds regular meetings to share ideas and there are plans for similar groups in other U.S. cities.

What Graduates Should Know About an IT Career

Here is some decent and simple advice. It is obviously not comprehensive or completely accurate but a is a very quick addition to other thoughts on the topic: What every graduate should know before entering the IT industry:

Your whole career in IT will be spent updating your skills
This follows on from the last point. If your skills become out of date, you will become vulnerable to losing your career. Because of this, IT is a career where it is difficult to thrive without having a real passion for it. Your employer may send you on expensive training courses, but unless you read up and experiment in your own time, you’re going to fall behind.

See more science, engineering and technology career tagged posts.

Indian Institute of Technology Thoughts

An interesting interview of an IIT graduate and CEO that really discusses how IIT graduates can help the Indian economy more than the title indicates – 5 things entrepreneurs must do to succeed:

First and foremost what is required is empathy and a genuine concern to improve the lot of the people. Next, there has to be a coordinated effort between the government and other agencies. Four focussed initiatives in each district around education, agriculture, industry and social equality could be identified and on an experimental basis ten districts could be identified and handed over to IIT-ians who have the zeal to bring about the transformation with a time bound agenda, with the commitment to support them through various agencies.

Leadership Initiatives for Teaching and Technology

LIFT2 (Leadership Initiatives for Teaching and Technology) is an innovative professional learning program for middle and high school science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) teachers. It is designed to help experienced and developing teachers relate classroom curriculum to authentic and relevant applications in the 21st Century workplace.
The program is based on a unique combination of graduate coursework, company sponsored externships in industry, the cornerstone of the program, and membership in an active community of learners.

Science and Engineering Graduate Data from NSF

NSF presents a large amount of data on the Characteristics of Recent S&E Graduates: 2003. The data covers undergraduates and graduates in 2001 and 2002. The report shows 937,700 bachelor’s graduates (*682,200 in science fields; 112,300 in engineering; and 143,300 in health care). And 246,700 master’s graduates (117,000 science; 47,000 engineering; 82,700 health).

Median 2003 salary for 2001 and 2002 bachelor’s graduates:

all science: $32,000
all engineering: $50,000

Some of the specific areas median salaries: computer and information sciences $60,000; electrical/computer engineering $70,000 and industrial engineering $70,000.

2003 median salaries for 2001 and 2002 masters graduates:

all science: $45,000
all engineering: $65,000

* the report totals do not exactly add do to rounding estimates by NSF.

Engineering Outsourcing Effects

A Business Week article discusses two Duke studies of Engineering jobs in the USA and world: Outsourcing: Job Killer or Innovation Boost?

One finds that companies are going offshore because they are desperate for talent and are shifting more complex work to nations such as India and China for strategic reasons. The other Duke study concludes that the offshoring phenomenon is all about cost and that there is no shortage of engineers in the U.S. Therefore, the labor shift is coming at the expense of U.S. jobs.

SMART Fellowships

The Science, Mathematics, And Research for Transformation Defense Scholarship for Service Program (SMART) is administrated by ASEE. As I have stated before – while I work for ASEE this blog is my own and is not associated with ASEE.

Program highlights include:

Starting salary/stipend ranging from $22,500 for undergraduates to $38,000 for doctoral students
Full tuition and related education fees and a book allowance of $1,000
Paid summer internships
Career opportunities after graduation

Read more about the program and apply online – the deadline is 5 February 2007. Article on the SMART program from ASEE’s magazine: PRISM.

The deadline from the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship is as early as tomorrow for some applications and as late as November 13th for others.

Educating Scientists and Engineers

Business Week has an articles discussing what business would like to see from graduates, Biotech’s Beef:

The problem is a disconnect between what universities are teaching and what biotech wants. “The focus of academia is getting basic and theoretical knowledge in place,”
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There are several weaknesses. First, recent grads lack the technical knowledge to carry out applied research in areas that straddle engineering, math, and computers. Second, job candidates have little awareness of what the Food & Drug Administration is looking for when it considers whether or not to approve a drug. Recent grads simply aren’t familiar with issues such as quality control and regulatory affairs.

This general idea is not new. But, as always (and probably more so if the nature of what is needed is changing faster today than in the past) the changing environment does require universities (and students, at least those that want to work in industry) to adapt.

But with H-1B quotas filling up earlier every year, Invitrogen has chosen to do more drug development in Japan, China, and India. It may also open facilities in Korea and Singapore, says Rodney Moses, Invitrogen’s vice-president of talent acquisition. Compensation in China and India is lower than in the U.S., but that’s not what motivates the move offshore, says Moses. “If the talent is located in Singapore, it’s just easier for us to go there.”

U.S. colleges take the problem seriously. State university systems in California, Wisconsin, and elsewhere are adding more industry-oriented classes.

High Pay for Engineering Graduates

Undergraduate engineering degrees top the list of best paid: Most lucrative degrees for college grads. This article offers a slight update to Lucrative college degree post from July.

Possibilities Ahead for Engineers

Possibilities and challenges ahead for engineers

To that end, engineering institutions should avoid focusing solely on lecture-based courses and ensure that students participate in team projects, research and experiential learning. Students should also learn communication skills and gain understanding of ethics and social responsibility, business organization, innovation and product development, in addition to engineering fundamentals, Vest said.
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The Senate is now working on legislation that would invest in making the United States more competitive with other nations when it comes to science and engineering education. The National Competitiveness Investment Act is based on recommendations from a recent federal report called “Rising Above the Gathering Storm,” which argued that science and engineering education is vital to U.S. economic interests.

Previous posts on proposed legislation: Graduate Scholar Awards in Science, Technology, Engineering, or Math – Proposed Legislation on Science and Education – Science and Engineering Innovation Legislation – The Innovation Agenda – Science and Engineering Fellowships Legislation