[SIGCIS-Members] A vote for history from a young student

Dear SIGCIS members, I wanted to tell you about a conversation I was party to with a group of high school students who had completed a pretty amazing robotics project: *http://tinyurl.com/ctukmdb* The students were asked what would motivate more of their peers to pursue science and technology. Expecting to hear something like, "Assign more cool projects," I was surprised that the first suggestion from a student was, "Teach the history of science." I think he meant technology too. The whole group agreed. (Of course, they suggested more cool projects as well! And some remarked that, since many of them were fortunate to grow up on farms, they learned about all kinds of technology, unlike urban kids who get exposed to so little.) Bill