The world's fleet of electric vehicles grew to over 6 million units last year. Within a decade, there will be enough electric cars on the road for every person in California, as global electric vehicle ownership is estimated to reach 20 million units by 2025. Learn more about electric cars at the Electric Vehicles Battery Tech USA 2023 Exhibition and Conference, March 6-7 in at the Hyatt Regency Orange County, California. 

A new report from the Managing the Future of Work Project at the Harvard Business School found that many people training and applying for jobs remain ill-equipped to enter the workforce. Report co-author, Manjari Raman, said to NPR: 

"Businesses thought it's enough to sit in advisory councils at the local community college. Very often the people on those councils are retired small business owners. You're not really seeing engagement from large employers … going to a community college and saying, ‘Look, I need about 50 or 60 or maybe 500 people to come and work for me. Here is the kind of workforce readiness I need. This is what I need in the curriculum.'"

The report says that communication is lacking between employers and community colleges. The report states that critical middle-skills positions are unfilled resulting in revenues are lost, and customers are dissatisfied. At the same time, some students come out of the community college system only to find that they are unemployable in their field of study or at a living wage. Employers do not find them “workforce ready” and capable of carrying out the more sophisticated technology-promoted tasks associated with middle-skills...

A new report from NSF's National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics (NCSES) provides high-level insights from multiple data sources into the diversity of the STEM workforce in the United States. Some key takeaways were concerning workforce, education, and degrees were: 

• The U.S. STEM workforce gradually diversified between 2011 and 2021, with increased representation of women and underrepresented minorities
• Persons with a disability who worked part time in an STEM-related occupation in 2021 reported wanting to work full time at about twice the rate of those without a disability
• Underrepresented minorities—Hispanic, Black, and American Indian or Alaska Native individuals—made up a higher share of the skilled technical workforce in 2021 than of workers who were employed in STEM occupations with at least a bachelor’s degree
• In 2020, women were underrepresented among degree recipients at all degree levels in physical and earth sciences, mathematics and computer sciences, and engineering

The full report can be accessed on the NSF website. 

A new book, with NSF-funded authors, is now available. The book, titled Leading Change in Gender and Diversity in Higher Education from Margins to Mainstream, has many chapters relating to the intersection of STEM, higher education, and diversity. Of particular interest to ATE Grantees may be the chapter "Improving gender diversity in STEM through an inclusive professional framework."

Each of the book's four sections topics unpack and speak to gender and diversity, equity, inclusion and access, social justice, and leadership and sustainability in higher education institutions (HEIs). Incorporating innovative processes and methods, the researchers address how the experiences of groups who have been subordinated and marginalized can be heard, proposing a re-imagination of empowerment and leadership within higher education and best practices for the benefit of ongoing higher education development.

This book is ideal reading for higher education leaders, students on higher education courses, leadership courses, gender in education, as well as researchers, practitioners, for topics of gender and diversity, equity, inclusion and access, social justice, leadership and sustainability. 

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The Community College Presidents' Initiative in STEM (CCPI-STEM), funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF), is designed to further engage community college leadership in the support of regional STEM education and workforce development through NSF ATE grants.  There is a national clarion call for a diverse workforce with STEM backgrounds for the millions of employment opportunities that remain unfilled.  

Join us on January 30, 2023 from 1:00 - 2:00 pm ET for the first of a series of Webcasts that will highlight the vision and mission of the grant with a focus on the 2-year sector. 

Participants will hear about the various opportunities to participate in regional dialogue and collaboration, receive support to learn more about the NSF's Advanced Technological Education funding program, and join a growing Community College network designed to address STEM education and workforce needs.

Please use this link to Register by January 28, 2023.

Community colleges and universities currently grapple with declining enrollments and soaring costs, among other issues. The latest item of concern is the surge of AI in educational settings, which has set off a frenzy of opinion pieces. ATE Central has round up several recent news sources regarding the use of AI in the classroom, in favor or against. 

In favor of a nuanced use of AI for the Atlantic, Ian Bogost writes that "ChatGPT isn’t a step along the path to an artificial general intelligence that understands all human knowledge and texts; it’s merely an instrument for playing with all that knowledge and all those texts... [AI apps] are surely not going to replace college or magazines or middle managers. But they do offer those and other domains a new instrument—that’s really the right word for it—with which to play with an unfathomable quantity of textual material."

An NPR article offers a look at how educators are viewing AI apps in the classroom from essays to homework. Another piece from Mind Matters expresses discontent on how easily technology makes writing work and homework now. 

Finally, the New York Times writes about the impact of AI on campuses. An op-ed from them...

Mark your calendar for the 2023 Women in Aviation International Conference on Feb. 23-25 in Long Beach, California! The conference will include inspiring keynote speakers, professional development seminars, education sessions, exhibit hall, and much more!

The Women in Aviation website states, "There's no better place to be inspired, share your enthusiasm, and connect with others who share your passion for the aviation industry. We look forward to gathering to connect, engage, and inspire with our valued members." 

This conference is aimed towards women in aviation careers, education, and all others interested. Register on the Women in Aviation website. Early registration ends January 17th!

A new report from Best Universities explores how the pandemic has changed college students from four and two year institutions. The report shows a trend that many 18-24 year old students have "began opting for alternative pathways, such as trade programs or the freedom from student loan debt provided by joining the workforce right away." The report also shows community college's impact on traditional and nontraditional students interested in alternative pathways. From the report,

"Community colleges make up the lion’s share of nontraditional student enrollment—which has been the case since at least 2015. And while enrollment since that time has nearly halved, community colleges retain nearly threefold the number of new nontraditional students each year than public four-year institutions."

Read the full report, which uses data from the National Student Clearinghouse Center, on the website for Best Universities. 

The Analytics for Equity Initiative is a new program led by the National Science Foundation (NSF) that is seeking proposals from researchers to use federal data to examine questions of equity, targeted around different agency-specific themes. The goal is for the federal agencies to then use the research to implement equity-focused, evidence-based strategies.

Multiple agencies are participating, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Department of Labor, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the Department of Health and Human Services. Each has identified equity-related themes in their evidence-building plans, known as Learning Agendas, that they want researchers to investigate.

The work has five central themes, including the NSF’s theme of equitable access to STEM research and education opportunities, as well as the environment and equity, health equity under climate change, equity in human services delivery, and workplace equity.

The full solicitation will be posted on Jan. 16, 2023, and will be available for at least 45 days.

To learn more, please review this program summary.