For my last few blogs I focused on how the current educational system needs to change in order to make U.S. students competative in a globalized world. Fortunately our state has been a leader in technology and this new global change, and this still continues. On Feb 16th. California gave out 45 million in research grants to 20 state universities and research laboratories, exceeding the federal governments plan for investment into stem cell research. Although this type of research also includes a moral aspect, it is a high-technology industry that is going to create more jobs in the future and other countries who are not intrigued by the moral issue may get the edge in the next 10 years if there is little investment in stem cell research. Nearby in our own town, Stanford received 10 grants worth 8 million dollars, and the J. David Gladstone Institute in San Francisco also recieved grants. The public financing also included the first publicly funded effort to clone a human embryo. Although this may be right or wrong, this is going to lead to a new era of medical technology. Already biopharmaecuticals are generating more and more capital each day and new companies are going public almost every day. The industry is growing at an amazing rate and these drugs also have no patent laws that expire them like convential drugs, companies are ensured to make a growing profit. I personally view this type of medical technology as a crucial area for the U.S. to invest in since workers in foreign countries once they acquire more wealth will want new drugs and healthcare. Also, since these bio-tech drugs are very difficult to produce, cheap copies cannot be made by foreign companies.
This is a perfect area for U.S. dominance since it will allow the U.S. to be an exporter of the technology and it will create jobs that demand highly educated researchers. Where this falls into educational philosophy is that public investment has to create enough educated graduates to work in new technology fields. Students have to understand that they must plan to work in these new areas if they want to have the high-paying jobs. Universities like Stanford should be producing as many domestic graduates as possible and public funding at the primary levels of education can help this. Just as the U.S. fed propaganda in education about the nature of the Soviet Union and tried to motivate people to work to research and make their country superior, the same has to happen today. It seems however that more enlightened states like California are doing the right thing and not waiting for the federal government to set a precedent before they start to change the nature of education.