STEM to STEAMIE Initiative aims to support Art. Design and Innovation and Entrepreneurship
By adding three key elements, WebProfessionals.org aims to expand and convert the fields of study representing Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) into a more inclusive and necessary field.
“Adding Art, Innovation and Entrepreneurship to the U.S. conversation around Science, Technology, Engineering and Math is a mission critical pathway to economic competitiveness,” said Bill Cullifer, Executive Director of the association of Web Professionals, WebProfessionals.org.
We’re spearheading the initiative and generating support from a number of experts representing business, industry, education and government including Webprofessionals.org members. The goal is to discuss and to communicate the critical need to incorporate Art, including Digital Design, Innovation and Entrepreneurship into the STEM conversation.
The initiative would create a new acronym, STEAMIE.
“It’s time to get real about STEM,” Cullifer said. “As much as we are big supporters in STEM, not everyone has an interest in science or math and we need to be more inclusive.”
Mark DuBois, Professor at Illinois Central College (ICC), agrees. “We also need to attract a broader audience including a growing number of women attracted to entrepreneurship and digital design,” he said.
What is STEM?
STEM fields or STEM education is an acronym for the fields of study in the categories of science, technology, engineering and mathematics. In the United States, the acronym was first used in education and immigration debates in initiatives to begin to address the perceived lack of qualified candidates for high-tech jobs. It addresses concern that the subjects are often taught in isolation, instead of as an integrated curriculum. Maintaining a citizenry that is well versed in the STEM fields is a key portion of the public education agenda of the United States. The acronym has been widely used in the immigration debate regarding access to United States work visas for immigrants who are skilled in these fields. It also has become commonplace in education discussions as a reference to the shortage of skilled workers and inadequate education in these areas.
What is STEAMIE?
Coined by the membership-supported organization, WebProfessionals.org, the acronym STEAMIE represents the fields of study in the categories of science, technology, engineering, mathematics plus arts, innovation and entrepreneurship. The aim is to be more inclusive and representative of what employers really want or need.
Why is STEAMIE important?
In 2009, the U.S. House Small Business Committee reported that one dollar spent on the Small Business Administration’s entrepreneurial development programs brings a return of $2.87 into the economy. The year before, 2008, these programs helped generate 73,000 new jobs and added $7.2 billion to the U.S. economy, according to a Feb. 11, 2009 press release by the House Committee on Small Business. This speaks volumes to the fact that entrepreneurial development programs, if done well, can be incredibly important to a nation’s job creation efforts as well as its economic development, according to a recent report published by the Gallop organization.
Innovation is important to business and individuals.
Innovation is no longer a “nice-to-have” element of business success; it’s a “must-have,” according to Keith Harmeyer and Mitchell Rigie, principals of www.SmartStorming.com.
“If innovation distinguished between leaders and followers in the recent past, today it increasingly distinguishes between survivors and the barely breathing,” Harmeyer said. “Innovation is the new Darwinism in business; the choice facing companies today is simple: innovate, or perish.”
Innovation isn’t new, it has been a business buzzword for years, Harmeyer said. “We’ve all read about it in business magazines and heard the reports on financial news stations. Harvard Business School professors lecture on it at conferences and scores of books address it. And the same companies are consistently held up as the elite innovators Apple, Google, Nintendo, JetBlue, Toyota, Target (and today again, WalMart). And there are hundreds and even thousands more you’ve never heard of, visionary companies that are seizing the opportunities (yes, opportunities) presented by the current economic phase, breaking the rules, establishing new standards, delivering incredible value, and then starting that process all over again…and again, and again.”
The two partners say that the innovation imperative doesn’t just apply to businesses. It also is a challenge that faces individuals as well. “The time to develop an innovation orientation is not tomorrow or next week or in the third quarter. It’s now.”
Entrepreneurship transforms dreams into profits.
There’s a misconception that people who can’t find work jump into entrepreneurship; however, statistics show that 76 percent of establishments of new businesses in 2003 were due to an aspiration to chase openings, according to canadiantradeenclave.ca.
Entrepreneurship is challenging task but the rewards it gives are often more than what an individual expects.
Entrepreneurship actually provides employment and helps the economy. It also contributes toward research and development and creates wealth for nations and individuals as well. “The business as well as the entrepreneur contributes in some way to the economy . . . in the form of products or services, by boosting the GDP rates or tax contributions. Their ideas, thoughts, and inventions are also a great help to the nation.”
“We can conclude that the higher the level of entrepreneurship is in the nation, the higher is its level of development,” “The crux motive of entrepreneurship is to transform the dreams into a profitable truth . . . Entrepreneurship strengthens the economic growth of a nation, as well as gives power to society, speeds up modernization and transforms the way of thinking of the common man.”
What others are saying