Giving Compass' Take:

• Andre M. Perry and Rodney Sampson argue the investment in STEM talent at historically black colleges and universities in the South would benefit local economies. 

• How can funders best support STEM talent in these areas? 

• Learn more about HBCUs economic impact on local communities. 

Earlier this month, sports and culture news site The Undefeated published a story about NASA mathematician Clyde Foster. His calculations and computations helped launch rockets into orbit during the Space Race between the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War era of the 1950s, ’60s, and early ’70s. For over three decades, Foster worked for NASA at the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. In that role, he actively recruited hundreds of black students into the space program. In addition, Foster helped found the computer science program at what is now Alabama A&M University.

His “quiet and relentless advocacy brought hundreds of African Americans into space industry jobs in the Deep South, helping to shift perceptions of black people in ways both subtle and profound,” wrote Michael Fletcher in the story.

Foster’s intelligence and dedication put people into space during one of the most tumultuous times in our nation’s history. He created hundreds of desirable jobs in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) for black Alabamians. Foster’s legacy of leveraging black talent in the STEM fields cannot be overstated. Industries desire the skills associated with STEM degrees because they are needed to design, produce, and extract the materials, goods, and services that make up the “traded sector” of the economy, which comprises everything traded outside of the region (from raw materials and algorithms, to cars and software) as opposed to skills in the non-traded sector that are related to industries that serve local residents (such as schools, construction, healthcare).

Yet more than 60 years after Foster started at NASA, racial disparities in employment in STEM-related fields persist. There are more than 4,000 such trade sector firms in Alabama’s Birmingham metro area, including businesses that tackle manufacturing, information, finance, and insurance, and professional, scientific, and technical services, according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s Annual Survey of Entrepreneurs. Yet only 3%—a measly 135—are black-owned. If we assume black STEM graduates have the skills required to start a business (only 39% of business owners had a college degree between 2007-2012), we should look to them to fill the gap. If the number of black-owned firms was proportionate to the percentage of college-educated residents who are black, 720 more businesses in Birmingham would be black-owned.

New strategies are needed to counter the racial disparities in business ownership, especially in the traded sectors, where black people are already primed to fill these roles. By ignoring this pool of talent, we are making Birmingham and the country as a whole less competitive and productive. We can start by investing in an overlooked source of emerging black talent: historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs).

Read the full article about the need for investment in STEM talent by Andre M. Perry and Rodney Sampson at Brookings.