WORKFORCE & EDUCATION

U.S. semiconductor companies face varied challenges in sustaining a well qualified semiconductor workforce equipped to continue the transformative innovations already under way-from sparking an early passion for science and engineering, through higher education, to retaining the best and the brightest from the world over and insuring that our human resource policies and practices are as advanced and current as our technology.

Evolution of the SIA Workforce Strategy Committee

This committee was established in 1998 to address a shortage of high tech workers. In 2004, an in-depth needs analysis with member companies prompted us to refocus our mission. Our money, resources and efforts will be directed over the next few years to four key areas:

• Understanding and impacting the current and anticipated supply, quality, and diversity of high tech workers needed by the industry.
• Meeting the need for improved math and science achievement in the K-16 grades, with a focus on improving the quality of 6th -12th grade math and science teachers.
• Understanding and addressing the most important Human Resource/Workforce issues affecting our member companies through discussion, benchmarking and best practice sharing.
• Effective public policy and lobbying efforts on issues that affect the semiconductor workforce.

Addressing the Shortage of Future Engineering Talent

Electrical Engineering (EE) degrees granted in 2003 increased modestly from 2002, but not sufficiently to cover the anticipated shortfall of engineers needed for semiconductor and nanotechnology jobs in the foreseeable future.

The number of students enrolling in EE and CS majors is also starting to drop. There was a one to five percent decline in enrollments in 2004 compared to 2003, and many schools are reporting that interest level in these majors is declining. A severe under-representation of Women, African Americans, Hispanics, and Native Americans in the populations of students enrolled in, and graduating with, technical and scientific degrees is compounding the problem.

Improving the Supply and Quality of Electrical Engineers for the Industry

SIA is partnering with the Semiconductor Research Corporation (SRC) on a nationwide Chip Design Challenge to increase visibility and interest in the analog and DSP skill areas. This exciting program was announced to the country's EE departments in November of 2004. SIA has funding of over $200K from these member companies: AMD, AMI, Analog Devices, Cadence, Freescale, IBM, Intel, NSC, and TI. The contest will reward schools that submit the most innovative System on Chip designs in two phases with prize money, access for members to the students involved and ultimately the opportunity for selected schools to have their designs fabricated in 2006 through a partnership with MOSIS.

In November 2004 we also launched the SIA Stay Tech Program (S.S.T.). SIA's goal is to improve the retention of already enrolled EE students. The fast path to improving the supply of this critical talent for our members is to keep more students in the program. The national fall out rate for underserved EE students is over 60 percent. The SST program will award 4-5 grants to schools selected for their innovative proposals to improve EE retention in 2005.

Training the Best Technician Workforce

Meeting the rapidly changing workforce needs of the semiconductor industry is a key focus of the Maricopa Advanced Technology Education Center (MATEC), an organization supported by the National Science Foundation. For the past several years, SIA has been a close partner with MATEC in providing curriculum as well as faculty training and development for semiconductor manufacturing programs at nearly 100 two- and four-year institutions nationwide. MATEC has developed more than 50 curriculum modules addressing all aspects of semiconductor manufacturing.

Focus on K-12 Teacher and Student Achievements

Our member companies are focused on improving the overall quality of our country's K-12 education system. In the last three years alone our member companies have invested more than a staggering $220,000,000 in these programs, reaching over 340,000 teachers and more than 6,500,000 students. Details of these innovative programs can be found in our annual K-12 Catalog, featuring current educational initiatives, best practices and available resources among SIA member companies. The catalog can be downloaded from www.sia-online.org/iss_workforce.cfm.

Tomorrow's graduate students who will usher in the revolutionary technologies made possible by nanotechnology are in junior high school today. Government has the primary responsibility for ensuring that these students have the math and science preparation to allow them to take advantage of nanotechnology's opportunities, but industry is contributing importantly to the effort.

SIA's collective efforts, along with others who understand the critical importance of K-12 student achievement in science and math, have increased funding for the national Math and Science Partnership program from $228 million in fiscal year 2003 to $290 million in fiscal 2004. The program is an important component of the "No Child Left Behind" Act, passed into law in January 2002.

SIA has also actively supported implementation of the National Science Foundation Authorization Act of 2002. The law calls for a doubling of the NSF budget over five years, and includes the Science, Mathematics, Engineering, and Technology Talent program, which offers competitive grants to universities and colleges to increase and retain the number of students completing degrees in these fields, and the Robert Noyce Scholarship program, offering grants to institutions of higher learning to encourage students in math, science, and engineering to pursue K-12 teaching careers.

The significant challenge of preparing students for the opportunities offered by tomorrow's technologies requires that industry do its part. We are continuing our partnership with Semiconductor Equipment and Materials International (SEMI) in sponsoring Workforce Development Institutes for high school teachers. The two-day institutes are educational programs for high school teachers to learn math and science experiments and teaching techniques to help engage students in pursuing technical degrees and semiconductor careers. Member companies are sending teacher to these programs with excellent results.

SIA is also a major sponsor of the annual Summer Institute of SECME-Science, Engineering, Communication, and Mathematics Enhancement-an intensive, two-week professional development program for nearly 600 K-12 educators across the country.

Attracting and Retaining Top Foreign Nationals

US industry and our nation's graduate schools continue to need the skills of foreign nationals who graduate from our universities. Due to the current H1B visa cap and other issues, the number of the world's best students applying to US graduate schools in EE plummeted over 50 percent in 2004. This is a dangerous trend that must be reversed to insure we continue to attract top students, keep the most competitive graduates in the US, and insure a continuing stream of the innovations and inventions that have defined this industry.

Under an H-1B visa, foreign nationals who graduate from US universities can stay in the country to work for US firms. As of October 1, 2003, the annual H-1B visa cap reverted to 65,000, down from an annual cap of 195,000 established in 2000.

To remain competitive globally, the industry seeks to hire the best new engineers graduating from American universities. According to 2004 Engineering Workforce Commission statistics on EE degrees, more than 54 percent of Masters' degrees and more than 65 percent of the PhDs awarded in engineering at US universities went to foreign nationals. In a typical employment year, about 2 percent of the total H-1B allotment is used by the semiconductor industry. These are small numbers in comparison to the total but those 1,400 individuals have some of the best minds on the planet. We must have the ability to continue to hire and retain this talent in the US or we will lose them to a competitive offshore market.

SIA worked closely with Compete America, as well directly with key elected representatives to introduce legislation that will exempt at least a portion of the Master's and PhD candidates from the H1B cap each year. More work still needs to be done, both to attract and retain the world's best students here in the US and to encourage more US students to pursue advanced degrees.

Understanding Our Workforce Dynamics

Each year our Workforce Committee completes an in-depth survey of industry trends. In 2004 we have added a number of new elements to this analysis to help us better understand the workplace, employment trends, attrition, skills usage, employment categories and compensation practices. These important issues will help us better prepare our member companies for being best-of-class, responsive HR organizations. In 2004 we also introduced some in-depth HR best practice sharing and benchmarking to help members network and expand their knowledge.

Our Workforce is Our Future

Attracting increased numbers of talented students to scientific and mathematical fields, and providing skilled teaching and other incentives needed to see students through to completion of undergraduate and graduate degrees remain a top SIA priority. Our nation cannot afford to allow current rates of attrition in critical engineering fields to jeopardize its continuing technology leadership. In addition to its sizable investment in K-12 and university educational programs, SIA remains committed to lifelong training of a qualified workforce and to retention of talented domestic and foreign nationals in the numbers needed to advance and benefit from semiconductor and microelectronic technologies.

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