Gates Voices Concerns About U.S. Education
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Bill Gates told Congress that overhauls of the nationâs schools and immigration laws are needed to keep jobs from going overseas.
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The public is a bit fickle about its schools, with mixed or even contradictory views about testing, vouchers and other education topics, a poll finds.
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Robert Gates, seemingly clinching confirmation as the new secretary of defense, said Tuesday the United States is not winning in Iraq and he's confident President Bush will listen to his ideas about forging a new war strategy.
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The education secretary says he wants more protection for degree subjects vital to the UK's future.
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By Benjamin J. Romano, Seattle Times  Jun. 1--If Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer were in charge of Washington state, shoring up education would be a higher priority even than easing the commute to Redmond.
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Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates chats with Berkeley students about everything from open source to malaria to the next Xbox.
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Americaâs already stratified system of higher education is becoming ever more so, and the chasm is creating all sorts of tensions as the less wealthy colleges try to compete.
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The education policy of the Bush administration is founded on two pillars: standardized testing and charter schools.    However, as reported in this New York Times article (see also the audio archive at NPR or nonsubscription coverage at the Boston Globe) , the US Department of Education's own testing data show that nationwide, charter schools are, in aggregate, lagging their public counterparts.
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(InfoWorld) - Bill Gates returned to Harvard University on Thursday to address its graduating class and receive an honorary degree after dropping out of the college 33 years ago to found Microsoft. He spent much of his address on the issues of global poverty and disease, advancing ideas on how to encourage more people to get involved in trying to resolve those huge problems. "I've been waiting more than 30 years to say this: 'Dad, I always told you I'd come back and get my degree,'" the Microsoft chairmanÂ said to hearty audience laughter as he began his speech. All commencement speakers are given an honorary Harvard degree, and Gates was awarded a Doctor of Laws degree. He's already received a handful of honorary doctorates from other universities around the world, the most recent being awarded by China's Tsinghua University in April. When Gates arrived at Harvard as a freshman in 1973, he was uncertain of his course of study but sure of his abiding passion for software. He quit Harvard in his junior year to focus full-time on the software startup, Microsoft, which he cofounded with his childhood pal Paul Allen. Gates described how he encouraged Harvard buddy Steve Ballmer, now Microsoft CEO, to quit business school and join the software company when it was only about 50 employees strong. "I'm a bad influence," Gates said. "That's why I was invited to speak to your graduation. If I had spoken at your orientation, fewer of you might be here today." He also reminisced about his accommodation at Harvard, saying his particular lodgings were a great place to live. "There were more women up there, and most of the guys were science-math types," Gates said, with a smile. "That combination offered me the best odds, if you know what I mean. This is where I learned the sad lesson that improving your odds doesn't guarantee success." However, Gates was all seriousness and a fair amount of fervor during most of his 25-minute address, expressing his one big regret about his time at college. "I left Harvard with no real awareness of the awful inequities in the world," adding it took him "decades to find out" about the unbelievable poverty and disease in developing countries. He's currently transitioning out of a day-to-day role at Microsoft to spend more time on his global philanthropy work in the areas of health and education at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. He began that move in June 2006, and it's expected to be complete by July 2008. "Humanity's greatest advances are not in its discoveries -- but in how those discoveries are applied to reduce inequity," Gates said. He spoke of trying to find ways to develop "a more creative capitalism" that could help market forces work better for the disadvantaged. "If you believe that every life has equal value, it's revolting to learn that some lives are seen as worth saving and others are not," he added. He described his frustration at being on a global health panel at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, several years ago and being bored rigid. "It was so boring even I couldn't bear it," Gates quipped. The contrast between that panel and a Microsoft launch event he'd just attended were starkÂ -- people were really excited about version 13 of a new piece of software. "I love getting people excited about software," he said. "But why can't we generate even more excitement for saving lives?" The issue isn't that people don't care about the world's ills, Gates argued, it's that they don't know what to do to resolve them. "Even with the advent of the Internet and 24-hour news, it is still a complex enterprise to get people to truly see the problem," he said. Using computers, the Internet, and breakthroughs in biotechnology, Gates believes that people can begin to cut through the complex problems of poverty and disease and start to improve lives. Gates challenged both Harvard University and its graduating students. For Harvard, he encouraged the academics to think about applying more of their resources to dealing with the world's issues and to ensure that their students left the college educated about global poverty, hunger, and the prevalence of curable diseases that continue to kill millions of children. For students, he exhorted each of them to embrace one of the world's complex issues and become a specialist on it, whether that issue becomes the focus of their career or more of a part-time passion. "Don't let complexity stop you. Be activists," Gates said. "Take on the big inequities. It will be one of the great experiences of your lives."
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Microsoft Corp.  Chairman  Bill Gates will testify Wednesday at a congressional hearing on  American business competitiveness, the Senate Health, Education  and Labor Committee said on Friday.
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Defense Secretary Robert Gates was cautious in his assessment of progress in the war as he prepared to meet Saturday with top U.S. military and civilian officials and the country's prime minister.
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BERKELEY, Calif. (CBS.MW) -- The computing problems to be solved in the next two decades will be more exciting than those that already have been solved, according to Microsoft&#39;s Bill Gates.
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Speaking to technologists during an appearance at the Computer History Museum, Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates touched on a number of topics, including Linux, Web services, grid computing and digital rights management.
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Keeping information secure in this age of laptop-lugging workers is the tech industry's most formidable challenge, Microsoft Corp. Chairman Bill Gates said Tuesday.
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Scientists express concerns the new education minister's religious views might hamper scientific research.
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England's education secretary says new Diplomas may be seen as inferior to GCSEs and A-levels.
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(InfoWorld) - Mountain View, Calif. - Speaking at Microsoft's Silicon Valley offices, U.S. Education Secretary Margaret Spellings on Tuesday suggested allowing willing specialists to teach math and science part-time to stem the skills gap in these fields. But roadblocks, such as state regulations and teachers unions, have prevented this, Spellings said during a Churchill Club event. "It's not by accident that there are all these barriers," Spellings said. Asked by an audience member what was being done attract new teachers to the profession, Spellings presented a dire prognosis. "The short answer is we're not doing enough to attract our best and brightest to the profession," she said. "I believe that we make it so difficult. There are so many barriers to entry into this profession, itâs absurd," Spellings said. An approach such as having experts teach math or science just from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. on Wednesday and Friday is not allowable under regulations that require teachers to be in school 185 days a year, she said. Instead, math and science are being taught by teachers who do not specialize in those fields, Spellings said. She touted the federal No Child Left Behind law as bringing up test scores but emphasized that much more needs to be done to improve education for students, particularly minority students. The needs of high school and middle school students also must be addressed, Spelling said. One audience member cited the issue of disruptive students that prevent education of the entire class. But Spellings said issues of discipline are reserved for the state and local governments rather than being a federal issue. "We have to figure all this out in ways that make sense," Spellings said.Â  Surprisingly, Spellings agreed with the statement, "It takes a village," to meet the educational needs of children, which was noted by an audience member identifying herself as a math teacher at a low-income charter school in downtown San Jose, Calif. This statement was coined by Democratic Sen. Hillary Clinton in a speech addressing the needs of children when she was first lady. Clinton's full statement was, "It takes a village to raise a child." "It does take a village," Spellings said.