David Baltimore '60
Professor of Mathematics Janet Talvacchia cuts the ribbon
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For Immediate Release: May 6, 2005
http://www.swarthmore.edu/news/
Nobel Laureate David Baltimore Calls on U.S. to Increase Production
of Science and Engineering Grads
Caltech President Gives Keynote Address
at Swarthmore Science Center Dedication
SWARTHMORE, Pa. - Giving the keynote address at the dedication of the new Science Center at Swarthmore College, Nobel laureate David Baltimore today called on American higher education to turn out more graduates trained in science and engineering.
Baltimore, the president of the California Institute of Technology and a 1960 Swarthmore graduate, noted that many engineering companies are establishing research centers in China, "where their most creative development work is being done." Research and technology energy is also moving to such countries as India, Russia, and Poland, he added -- and away from the United States.
Read President Alfred Bloom's Introductory Remarks
"In America today, our great universities are not turning out the number of graduates trained in science and engineering that we need," Baltimore said. "I say this because I hear it from people who run technology-intensive companies. We have made up the gap over the last decades by importing graduate students and post-doctoral trainees from abroad. But that source is becoming more difficult to depend upon what with stricter immigration rules, the recruiting activities of universities abroad, and the increasing quality of institutions in China and India."
Baltimore shared the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1975 with fellow Swarthmore graduate Howard Temin '55 for their work on the interaction between tumor viruses and cells. A seminar room in the new center is named in honor of the two.
The $77 million Science Center, a top priority of Swarthmore current $230 million fund-raising campaign, features spacious state-of-the-art laboratories, innovative spaces for faculty and student interaction across the science disciplines, and several design elements aimed at minimizing harmful effects on the local environment. Swarthmore has to date raised $184 million in The Meaning of Swarthmore campaign, which runs through 2006.
The failure of the U.S. to maintain its edge in science education has dire implications for American competitiveness, Baltimore told the audience at the Lang Performing Arts Center. "This is setting the base for China and the others to compete with us in what has been our great strength, technology development," he said. "It is imperative that we increase the number of technically trained people in the U.S. For the defense industry, which does not hire foreign nationals, this imperative is felt most strongly."
Although liberal arts colleges do not have graduate programs and do not focus on research, Baltimore praised Swarthmore and its peer institutions for contributing to the nation's technical talent base by turning out "particularly broadly trained scientists and engineers."
"For Swarthmore, education is the main goal, with research an important but ancillary activity," Baltimore said. "But science is about research, so if Swarthmore is to continue to turn out the terrific scientists that it has produced for so long, it is crucial that research opportunities be available. Thus, the focus on laboratory science represented by this building is so important to Swarthmore continuing to serve the critical educational role in the sciences that it has served for so long."
For more background on Swarthmore and the sciences, see a special report from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at http://www.hhmi.org/bulletin/summer2004/wellspring/passion.html
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