Building better schools to harvest better minds

The average public school education is far too slow, easy, and boring for young students who are aiming for a career in science and technology. When I was placed in New York City’s public Stuyvesant High School for academically gifted students, I was shocked and awakened by the challenge facing me. Without that challenge, which came mainly from a critical mass of bright, intensely curious students, I would never have become an engineer and a PhD physicist.

I propose that the US government fund and build 435 new free public high schools of science, like my Stuyvesant and the Bronx High School of Science, that would be locally controlled. The schools could be built over seven years at the rate of 63 per year, 1 in each congressional district, plus 6 for the District of Columbia, Guam, and Puerto Rico. High-tech industries would help in many ways.

The cost would be roughly $4 billion per year for seven years. We can afford it. There are bright, creative minds inside youngsters of every skin color, ethnicity, and religion imaginable. Instead of Congress reluctantly granting up to 120 000 special visas each year for talented foreigners to work in our hightech industries, why not harvest the best minds from among young people born in America? China and India, with a combined population of 2.4 billion, are doing this now.