Scientists and engineers with PhD and other advanced degrees play a central and growing role in American life.
Graduate education is basic to achieving national goals in two ways.
Second, graduate scholarship and research are key contributors to meeting broad national goals of technological, economic, and cultural development. The increase in scientific and technological knowledge and the ways in which that knowledge is applied are fundamental to the pursuit of many general national objectives, including developing new technologies and industries, combating disease and hunger, reducing environmental pollution, developing new sources of energy, and maintaining the competitiveness of American industry. Persons educated in and part of our graduate education system provide expert service to society via their development of original ideas, which are brought to fruition in teaching, industry, business, and government. Graduate students often go beyond the thinking of their professors and create a new generation of science and engineering thought. The student learns from the professor, but the professor also learns from the student.