Green Tech robot's critical pieces of hardware: a pair of trophies

When 16-year-old Julian Medrano told me his Austin high school team took two trophies in state robotics competition last month, that got my attention. But I was more amazed when he told me his team was from Eastside Memorial's Green Tech High School a campus that many have written off for its failures.

Turns out that the East Austin campus is growing engineers by the dozens. And it's hard not to notice that the kids in the seats are mostly brown.

Too often, students — Hispanic and African American boys in particular — have set their career goals on the NFL, NBA, Major League Baseball or the entertainment business. They fixate on the cool poses, expensive cars and bling sported by athletes and entertainers and believe that a ball or rap lyrics is a ticket to success.

So when a teenager tells you that he and other classmates are taking (and passing) the tough math- and science-heavy prerequisites for engineering, we all should pay attention.

The United States lags behind other industrialized nations in preparing students to be world-class engineers and scientists, studies show. The consequences will be felt in a future in which our country no longer is the leader in the innovation and technology that are fundamental to our economic prosperity.

The international "Teaching Math to the Talented" study found that the percentage of students in the U.S. class of 2009 who were highly accomplished is well below that of most countries with which the United States generally compares itself.