Obama pushes science education
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President Obama confronted a “cougar cannon” this morning and he saw:
a) A new version of a gun to hunt animals;
b) A secret weapon to win in Afghanistan;
c) A television pilot explaining intergenerational mating rituals;
d) None of the above.
If you picked (d), congratulations! You are ready to join the president’s crusade to improve science and math education.
Obama unveiled his program, $260 million in companies’ donations to take the hard sciences into more classrooms with television programs and celebrity science personalities. As part of the effort, science will be highlighted at an annual science fair.
“If you win the NCAA championship, you come to the White House. Well, if you’re a young person and you’ve produced the best experiment or design, the best hardware or software, you ought to be recognized for that achievement too,” Obama said in a televised presentation, of his “Education to Innovate” campaign.
“Scientists and engineers ought to stand side by side with athletes and entertainers as role models, and here at the White House we’re going to lead by example. We’re going to show young people how cool science can be,” the president insisted.
The likelihood of physicists being as big on campus as football players may seem far fetched. But the president did his part, including the unveiling of the “Cougar Cannon,” a science project created by two Virginia students as an example of what the president called “the extraordinary promise of American young people.”
“I’d like to invite Steven Harris and Brian Hortelano from Oakton High School to come up here and demonstrate what their team has built,” Obama said. “It’s flashing so far. I don’t see it whirling,” Obama said as the audience laughed.
The purpose of the device is to scoop up and toss moon rocks, but it look a bit like a mobile batting cage or a very fancy device to automatically return basketballs for someone shooting hoops.
‘How long did it take for you to build this?’ Obama asked, according to a pool report of the confrontation.
Six weeks, the students replied.
‘This is all stuff you can get at Radio Shack?’ Obama said.
No, the students said, shaking their heads.
--Michael Muskal
