The Press-Dispatch
Issue link: https://www.ifoldsflip.com/i/596385
The Press-Dispatch Local Wednesday, November 4, 2015 A- 13 SAVE $200 NOW $799 SAVE $200 NOW $599 SAVE $200 NOW $399 Ironbridge Firm 12 M ONTHS FREE FINANCING! * 12 M ONTHS FREE FINANCING! * *Q UA LIFIED CUSTO M ERS O N LY – *M IN IM UM P URCH A SE REQ UIRED – SEE STO RE FO R D ETA ILS HOME COMFORT CENTERS 650 Division Road, Jasper (Next to Jasper Engines & Transmissions) 812-482-2246 Mon., Tues. & Thurs. 9-5:30; Wed. & Fri. 9-7; Sat. 9-3 105 N. JFK Avenue, Loogootee 812-295-5444 www.englertshomecomfortcenter.com * * Queen Set Queen Set Queen Set SAVE $200 NOW $799 SAVE $200 NOW $599 NOW ONTHS FREE ONTHS FREE LY – *M IN HOME * * Queen Set Queen Set Queen Opening Soon Kedleston Firm Charlwood Plush May God bless you, Charley, Marie, Junior & Susan, Ron & Kim Aldridge Thank You Charles Aldridge and family wish to express special thanks to the Arthur GB Church for spon- soring the fundraiser on Oct. 10 for Charley aer his tractor accident. Also, for the responses of other churches, neighbors, friends and our families. It was greatly appreciated. Most of all, thanks for the prayers from everyone. THANK YOU anks to everyone who helped me with my campaign for Petersburg Mayor. I appreciate all who placed signs, offered encouragement and voted for me. I will do my best to build on our progress to make Petersburg a better place to live. R.C. Klipsch Paid for by e Committee to Elect R.C. Klipsch Mayor The Resurgent Library by Bart Stinson Stop the brain drain "A big reason America is falling behind other coun- tries in science and math," the New York Times opined in 2013, "is that we have ef- fectively written off a huge chunk of our population as uninterested in those fields or incapable of succeeding in them." Actually there was more than one chunk, but the one that concerns us in Pike County is women. National- ly, you "make up nearly half the work force but have just 26 percent of science, tech- nology, engineering or math jobs," according to the most recent Census. In the coming digital economy, smart people must be Pike County's biggest as- set and not merely its big- gest export. We can't write off half the brainpower of Pike County and bleed off much of the other half and expect to prosper. We must apply brakes to the brain drain, yes, but we also need to mine the diamonds in our own back yard. "In elementary, middle, and high school, girls and boys take math and science courses in roughly equal numbers, and about as ma- ny girls as boys leave high school prepared to pursue science and engineering majors in college," accord- ing to a 2010 American As- sociation of University Wom- en study. "Yet fewer women than men pursue these ma- jors. Among first-year col- lege students, women are much less likely than men to (declare a) major in sci- ence, technology, engineer- ing, or math (STEM). "By graduation, men out- number women in nearly every science and engineer- ing field, and in some, such as physics, en- gineering, and computer sci- ence, the differ- ence is dramat- ic, with wom- en earning on- ly 20 percent of bachelor's de- grees." The impact on Pike Coun- ty is that women forego in- come, and that the overall Pike County workforce be- comes less valuable and less attractive to potential high- wage employers. In the long term, its impact is compounded by foregone influence. Students who ma- jor and excel in STEM sub- jects tend to become indus- try leaders. If Pike County kids never get in the game, they'll never be in charge. Who's going to take a pro- posal to relocate to Pike County seriously—a dotcom executive from Palo Alto, a dotcom executive from Salt Lake City, or a dotcom exec- utive from Spurgeon? Stanford sociologist Shel- ley Correll makes a statis- tical case that girls' seem- ingly voluntary decisions to avoid STEM careers are in- fluenced by the cultural be- lief that science and math are male domains. "Boys do not pursue mathemati- cal activities at a higher rate than girls do because they are better at mathematics," Correll writes." They do so, at least partially, because they think they are better." Most studies suggest that schoolgirls suffer from no innate inferiority in science and math. What we have is a failure of imag- ination: if a girl doesn't see her- self as capa- ble and resilient enough to major in a STEM sub- ject and succeed in a STEM ca- reer, she will vol- untarily trivialize herself. "Being smart," the A AUW study concluded, "is a choice." Moms and Grandmas, this is where you come in. Google that A AUW research report online. It has practical recommendations how you can help your daughter or granddaughter to overcome the obstacles. If you're a technophobe, ask one of your kids or grandkids to print it out for you. Here's the URL: http://www.aauw.org/ files/2013/02/Why-So-Few- Women-in-Science-Technol- ogy-Engineering-and-Math- ematics.pdf At the Pike County Pub- lic Library, we hope to buy Danica McKellar's series of teen and preteen books about math, written in hip, chatty language you might hear at a high school locker: from Math Doesn't Suck: How to Survive Middle School Math Without Losing Your Mind or Breaking a Nail, all the way through her books on pre-al- gebra, geometry and algebra. In the meantime, we've purchased the Careers for Tech Girls series (Math, Sci- ence, Engineering, Comput- er Science, Technology and Video. Otwell Elementary pumpkin seed project Terra Knust's second grade class counted pumpkin seeds as a part of an online project for students across the U.S. The class pumpkin seed to- tal was over 1,900 seeds. The class will be submitting the numbers online. Above: Participating were (l to r): Maddie Miles, Taylor Uppencamp, Mathew Baker, Keith Perkins, Silas Anson and Raeleigh McCracken . Below: Pictured (l to r): Sophie Boyd, Avion Murry, Lucy Yon, Corbin Traylor and Abby Boyd. Dug up an old friend Gayle Williams' old friend pumping gas after a day of fun.