STEM Educator Pipeline: Doing the Math on Recruiting Math and Science Teachers

Oct 9, 2026

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Examines the feasibility of achieving the federal goal of recruiting, preparing, and supporting 100,000 high-quality STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) teachers over a decade. The report analyzes the annual target and key assumptions, including alternative certification participation rates and the size of the ACT/SAT-tested college entrant pool. It introduces definitions for STEM interest and teaching capability, using ACT college readiness measures and emphasizing subject-matter expertise and effective classroom practices as necessary for quality teaching.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages8

Reading Time20 min

AccessFree to download

Breaking Down the Annual Target

Defining STEM Interest and Teaching Capability

ACT Research & Policy | Issue Brief | | --- | | June 2013 | STEM Educator Pipeline: Doing theMath on Recruiting Math and Science Teachers Science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) occupations are expected to grow at amuch higher rate than non-STEM occupations (17.0 percent from 2008 to 2018 compared to 9.8 percent 1), and employers claim that there are shortages of qualified workers.2 Now, according to the National Science Board, “all students [must] develop their capabilities in STEM to levels much beyond what was considered acceptable in the past,” 3 even for previously low-skilled jobs. The STEM pipeline needs to be expanded, and most efforts are focused on increasing the number of STEM graduates. Yet an essential component of this pipeline is the need for more high-quality science and math teachers.4 Since the mid-2000s, there have been proposals to increase the total number and quality of K–12 STEM educators.5 During the 2006 State of the Union Address, President Bush proposed as part of the American Competitiveness Initiative a plan to produce 100,000 high-quality math and science teachers by 2015.6 The plan was included in the America COMPETES Act as introduced to Congress in May 2007, 7 but ultimately it was not a part of the enacted legislation. Four years later, the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) revived the initiative, recommending that “the Federal Government . . . set a goal of ensuring the recruitment, preparation, and induction support of at least 100,000 new STEM teachers over the next decade.”8 The PCAST report, citing research by Richard Ingersoll, acknowledged that the 10,000-STEM-teacher per-year goal was insufficient to address the annual demand of approximately 25,000 STEM teachers per year,9 but that the quality of the new STEM teachers was critical. Instead of focusing solely on increasing the number of STEM teachers, PCAST recommended trying to increase the number of quality STEM teachers. To address the shortage of qualified math and science teachers, President Obama adopted the PCAST recommendation and proposed an $80 million investment as part of a public-private partnership to prepare 100,000 new math and science teachers over the next decade (10,000 per year) .10 The STEM Teacher Pathways detailed in the President’s Fiscal Year 2014 Budget would expand pathways to teacher certification as well as develop new recruiting strategies to place“talented recent college graduates and mid-career professionals in the STEM fields in high-need schools.”11 The emphasis of the STEM Teacher Pathways is that the teachers are new, highly effective teachers. Likewise, the private analog,“100Kin10,” stresses that the need is not simply for new teachers, but for “100,000 new, excellent science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) teachers in 10 years.”12 The persistence of the 100,000-STEM-teachers in-a-decade goal illustrates that there is a need for these high-quality teachers but that it is a challenging undertaking. This paper uses data from the ACT® college readiness assessment to examine the feasibility of reaching the 100,000 quality-STEM-teachers-in-a-decade goal. So, how difficult will it be to achieve this goal? [www.act.org/research-policy](www.act.org/research-policy) [research.policy@act.org](research.policy@act.org) for more information. © 2013 by ACT, Inc. All rights reserved. The ACT® is a registered trademark of ACT, Inc., in the USA and other countries. 20998 Breaking Down the Annual Target Assessing the goal’s feasibility requires a couple of assumptions.13 The first relates to the annual target. Although the federal goal is 100,000 high-quality STEM teachers in a decade, not all 10,000 per year will be comprised solely of recent college graduates. Not all science and math teachers are certified to teach through the traditional pathways. Alternative pathways exist for recent college graduates who did not major in education an

FAQs

What federal goal does the report assess?

It assesses the feasibility of reaching the goal of recruiting, preparing, and supporting 100,000 new high-quality STEM teachers over ten years.

Why does the report focus on annual targets?

Feasibility requires assumptions about how the decade goal translates into yearly numbers, including what share comes from traditional versus alternative certification routes.

How does the report define STEM interest and teaching capability?

STEM interest is defined using students’ intended majors when registering for ACT, while teaching capability is assessed using ACT College Readiness measures combined with characteristics linked to effective math and science instruction.

Oct 9, 2026

Upload by Ben