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Phil Mickelson's Science Project

By: William McGurn

Wall Street Journal

Back when Phil Mickelson was a child, he came up with a project for science class that hinted at his future: an experiment measuring which compression golf ball was best in terms of distance and accuracy.

Three decades and three Masters' jackets later, he's busy with an even more ambitious science project: the Mickelson ExxonMobil Teachers Academy. The academy is sort of a summer camp for science teachers, where third, fourth and fifth grade teachers come to learn how to improve their teaching of math and science. So the morning after finishing the British Open, Mr. Mickelson has flown into town for the start of this week's academy at the Liberty Science Center in Jersey City, N.J.

"I've always used math and science in my career," Mr. Mickelson explains over coffee, his conversation laced with references to coefficients, vectors and vortices. "It helps me know what I need to focus on. On putting, for example, at three feet the success rate is about 99%. At four feet it drops off to 88%; at five feet to 75%; at six feet to 62%; and so on.

"Because I understand that, I concentrate on making the shots where I have the greatest probability of success, which can save me exponential strokes on my game."

Mr. Mickelson's hope is that by helping teachers, the academy will help America's kids experience similar aha! moments of their own as they realize the applicability of math and science to their daily lives.

Mr. Mickelson's wife, Amy, once said she thought her husband had "an astronaut trapped inside him," and in ExxonMobil the golf pro found a willing partner for his enthusiasm. Truman Bell, the company's senior program officer for education and diversity, notes that his company employs 80,000 people world-wide—15,000 of them scientists. Like many companies, ExxonMobil worries that American kids don't get enough math or science compared to their peers in countries such as China and India.

Mr. Mickelson shares that concern. "I used to think that companies went overseas for cheap labor. That may be part of it. But I've learned that the larger issue is to attract people who have the engineering and other skills they need."

It's not just Google and Intel and Apple and ExxonMobil that have a hard time finding enough people with these skills. So do the public schools, with the result that, at least in the lower years, the majority of math and science courses are taught by people who never studied the subjects in college. Hence the academy program, which is designed by experts from Math Solutions and the National Science Teachers Association, and which emphasizes the link between these two fields.

But why the focus on third to fifth grade? After all, American kids don't do too badly at that age. The real drop-off in science scores tends to come later.

Mr. Bell says the answer is twofold. First, the academy aims to help teachers kindle interest in math and science at a young age. By eighth grade, many of these kids will be choosing their high school courses.

That leads to the second point: Unless students get a firm grounding in the fundamentals early, they simply are not going to be able to take high school math and science at the levels they need to study, say, engineering in college. Unfortunately, while most parents would love their kids to learn math and science, often they do not appreciate how important it is to begin early. According to a recent survey by Public Agenda, two out of three American moms and dads said they felt there was plenty of time for their kids to wait until middle and high school to learn science.

But children who wait this long are effectively out of contention for many of the best science jobs even before they've finished grade school. "If you don't get the basics, you're out of luck," says Mr. Bell. "[America doesn't] do a good job of retooling."

When this week's program is concluded, some 2,600 teachers will have gone through the academy since its founding in 2005. Though there are few metrics about results, some outside research suggests that the training they receive is leading to increased use and frequency of math and science in the classrooms of academy alumni. Mr. Mickelson says it's a 15- to 20-year bet.

"It's hard to teach a subject when you don't feel good about it or lack confidence," he says. "We bring teachers on an all-expenses-paid trip, put them up at a good hotel with good food and give them good instructors. Most of all, we treat them like professionals.

"We hope that by getting them excited about teaching science, we'll have more American kids excited about studying math and science."

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