KEILAR: A recent speech by a sophomore at Georgia Tech is lighting up the internet. Have you seen it? It's pretty good. Well, the timing could not be better as it turns out. Tom Foreman explains in this week's "American Journey."</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If you want to change the world --</s>TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Maybe no one else in the country whipped up more excitement about math and science this month than Georgia Tech Sophomore Nick Selby whose rousing speech to incoming freshmen has been seen more than 2 million times on YouTube.</s>NICHOLAS SELBY, GEORGIA TECH SOPHOMORE: If you want to build the ironman suit, you're in Georgia Tech, you can do that.</s>FOREMAN: But at schools everywhere, especially those where science, technology, engineering and math, the stem studies are king, a more profound excitement has been steadily growing. Georgia Tech President, Bud Peterson.</s>G.P. "BUD" PETERSON, PRESIDENT, GEORGIA TECH UNIVERSITY: People all around the world realize that in order for a country to remain competitive globally, they have to have a work force that's trained and educated in the stem fields.</s>FOREMAN: The White House certainly knows it. The president wants to see 100,000 new stem teachers trained over the next decade.</s>BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A higher education is the single best investment you can make in your future, and I'm proud of all the students who are making that investment.</s>FOREMAN: And all of this is not just about making the country more competitive. Researchers have found students in stem fields generally enjoy better returns on their education investment with more job options and higher salaries. An average engineering graduate, for example, can easily start at 65,000 a year, and with one out of five American jobs now stem related, that's enough to make students and parents at many strong stem schools very excited, indeed.</s>SELBY: I am doing that!</s>FOREMAN: Tom Foreman, CNN, Washington.
Stoking Excitement About The Sciences