Thanks for the comment, William! We’d love to see states adopt these or similar indicators as well. One leading example is Minnesota; the state independently developed a similar system of indicators for STEM education, and we understand that the effort has been very successful so far to monitor critical data in their state and inform state policy decisions. More info here: http://www.mncompass.org/education/stem/overview. Other states have worked with researchers studying the STEM Indicators to collect and make the data useful at the state level.  For example, Rolf Blank at NORC developed an online reporting system for capturing data on the STEM Indicators related to state assessment policies in science and math. Twenty states participated last year and that number continues to grow. More info here: stem-assessment.org.

Thank you, Jake, for your comment and question! The answer is it's both. The NRC committee intended the development of the indicator system to be ongoing. The charge was to build the system incrementally rather than wait for all data collection measures to be available. At the time the indicators were proposed, the NRC committee recognized that they were at different stages of development. Some indicators could be measured, at least in part, by existing data. Others could be measured with modest edits or additions to existing surveys, such as those conducted by the National Center for Education statistics. We outline these sources in SRI's roadmap, available at http://stemindicators.org/roadmap/. Yet still some of the indicators required further conceptual work and some preliminary research before a data collection plan to measure them validly and reliably at scale could be solidified.  Recognizing this, NSF issued a Dear Colleague Letter to fund a series of EAGER grants to advance knowledge about how to measure the indicators. Three of these projects are featured in our video, and more information about these and the other projects can be found here: http://stemindicators.org/stem-education-resear....

Glad to hear it, Heidi! Certainly as you know from Monitoring Progress (https://www.nap.edu/catalog/13509/monitoring-progress-toward-successful-k-12-stem-education-a-nation?utm_expid=4418042-5.krRTDpXJQISoXLpdo-1Ynw.0), some of the 14 indicators required more development than others. A number of the DCL researchers funded by NSF (http://stemindicators.org/stem-education-researchers/dclprojects/) focused on indicators 4, 5, and 6 (Adoption of instructional materials in grades K–12 that embody rigorous, research-based standards; Classroom coverage of content and practices in rigorous, research-based standards; Teachers’ science and mathematics content knowledge for teaching). These indicators in particular required a good deal of work to figure out how they could be measured—and we as a field are still wrestling with questions about how to capture data on these indicators feasibly and cost-effectively at scale. We’re pleased that some of these projects have yielded some amount data already. More details on data collection development can be found on our Roadmap: http://stemindicators.org/roadmap/.     

Thanks, Shuchi, for raising this question. At the time the indicator system was conceptualized, the NRC committee decided to focus on the science and math parts of STEM because the bulk of the research and data concerning STEM education at the K-12 level relates to mathematics and science education; research in technology and engineering education was not as mature because the teaching of those subjects was less prevalent in K-12 (read more about their process here: https://www.nap.edu/catalog/13158/successful-k-12-stem-education-identifying-effective-approaches-in-science). Recognizing this, however, the committee did not envision the indicators as static. They were designed to measure aspects of STEM teaching and learning that, to the best of our current knowledge, can enhance students' interest and competencies in STEM. It is likely that needs will emerge for updated or additional indicators as the empirical research base continues to grow in areas like computer science, technology, and engineering. We welcome ideas from researchers like you working in this area for what those potential “early” indicators might be!

Hi Kathy – great question! We think that this would be an excellent use of some of the indicators, particularly Indicator 6 (Teachers’ science and mathematics content knowledge for teaching) and Indicator 7 (Teacher participation in STEM-specific PD). You may be interested in the concept paper that Suzanne Wilson of the University of Connecticut wrote last year exploring some of the policy implications of the indicator system, Measuring the Quantity & Quality of the K-12 STEM Teacher Pipeline (http://stemindicators.org/concept-paper-2/).