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American leaders have been concerned to improve education since the 1950s, when the Soviet launching of Sputnik in 1957 prompted endless soul-searching about deficiencies in American scientific education. It is now hard to recall the political and social turmoil Sputnik spawned. James Rutherford, a member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science,compared two seismic events that focused Americans on the country's unpreparedness in an overseas enemy -- Pearl Harbor and Sputnik:
"The military and the politicians received the blame for Pearl Harbor, not educators; in the Sputnik instance, the finger of blame quickly and sternly pointed at the schools."
Among the educational concerns Rutherford identified in the aftermath of Sputnik were these:
