Hrabowski discusses importance of minorities in STEM fields

By Tina Nazerian     2/7/13 6:00pm

 

Members of the Rice and Houston community gathered Jan. 31 to listen to University of Maryland, Baltimore County, President Freeman A. Hrabowski III speak about education as part of the President's Lecture Series. 

Hrabowski, the chair of President Barack Obama's Advisory Council for Excellence for African-Americans, focused on the underrepresentation of minorities in science, technology, engineering and mathematical fields. 

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"When you get to [STEM], we have too few Americans, and when you get to minorities, you're talking about even fewer, and when you talk about women ... the numbers continue to go down," Hrabowski said.

According to Hrabowski, believing that Americans are not good at math and science is a self-fulfilling prophecy, and a focus on education will encourage dreams and build potential.

"It occurs to me that the fundamental purpose of education is to teach children and others to dream about the possibilities and then to help them acquire the skills and the values they need to reach [their] dream," Hrabowski said.

In 1988, the university Hrabowski attended encouraged African-American males to do well in STEM fields and go on to become graduate students and get advanced degrees, Hrabowski said. 

"The idea of building community on campus became very important ... [Community] meant mutual support among the students, ... building trust among them, ... high expectations, ... talking about what collaboration and group work could lead to, ... and finally, it meant very, very careful and deliberate involvement of researchers," Hrabowski said.

According to Hrabowski, his university now focuses on getting students to do well during their first year in a STEM major.

"If you can help a student earn at least B's in the first year of science and engineering, ... [know] how to work in groups, understand the importance of rigorous work ... and ... curiosity, and get them into labs early, it's amazing what's possible," Hrabowski said.

Hrabowski said that as a child, he listened to Martin Luther King Jr. speak at his church and that at the age of 12, he marched with King in Birmingham, Ala., for which he was jailed for five days. King and the parents of the children gathered outside the jail. 

"I'll never forget [what King] said, 'What you do this day as children, in 1963, will have an impact on children who have not been born,'" Hrabowski said. "It was amazing that 25 years after that, ... I thought back to my segregated environment ... and enjoying being with my own people but wanting to know what it would be like to see if I was as smart as other kids since society wanted to say white kids were smarter than we were."

Words, thoughts, actions, habits and character are linked and must be watched, Hrabowski said. 

"I challenge you, Houston, Rice: Watch your thoughts; they become your words," Hrabowski said. "Watch your words; they become your actions. Watch your actions; they become your habits. Watch your habits; they become your character."

Maxfield-Oshman Chair In Engineering Richard Tapia said he has advocated having diverse speakers at Rice.

"For many years, I've pushed that when we have speakers, we should have speakers not only of all backgrounds, but [also] speakers for people of all backgrounds," Tapia said. "Representation is a critical issue to this country."

Tapia said he thinks Hrabowski's message was about excellence. 

"I took away from him ... excellence," Tapia said. "And excellence requires two components - a certain sensitivity and positive encouragement for students, but it also requires not watering things down and not compromising."

Sid Richardson College freshman Alex Nunez-Thompson said he found the speech engaging. 

"For somebody who's so accomplished, I expected more of ... that stately university [president], ... but from the moment he started speaking, I was engaged," Nunez-Thompson said. "I was laughing at times, I teared up at other times. He just seemed like somebody who's very down-to-earth but optimistic at the same time."

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