The USA needs more engineers and scientists to continue to drive our economy and secure our country.  Our military’s dominance is obviously tied to our technology.  We couldn’t possibly match China man for man due to the shear number of Chinese available to fight.  Our economic dominance is also due to technology.  Technology allows us to have higher levels of productivity and innovation allows us to open up enitrely new markets.  But importing foreign engineers isn’t the answer.

A couple of quick definitions…  Foreign born engineer in this context means a person who was born and primarily raised in foreign country.  Native born engineer in this context means person who was primarily raised in the US.

I work in the Aerospace and Defense industry.  The reasons for wanting native born engineers are obvious.  The security risk posed by a native born engineer is generally considered to be less than a foreign born engineer all other things being equal.

I’ve got a BSME and MSEE and I attended 4 universities to get those degrees.  Most engineering programs are comprised of something like 30% foreign born students; my universities included.  Many of those students would go home if they could have the right kind of life style in their home country.  Many of them have begun going home as the economic conditions in China and India improve.  The money they generate with their brains stays in the country they live in.

We should always encourage the best and brightest to come here, live here, make us stronger.  I am also in favor of teaching engineering to any person from any country that has the drive, brains and money to come get that education.  However, most of the foreign engineers I met were no better or worse than the native born engineers. 

The better the economic conditions at home, the more likely a foreign born engineer is to return to their home country.  If they come here for the education and take that education back to their home country then they have primarily made their home country stronger not the USA.  I have no issue with this but I am primarily concerned with the strength of the USA.  As such, we, in the USA, should be focusing on graduating more native born engineers not recruiting foreign engineers.

I welcome anyone from any country to come and get educated in the USA.  I prefer those that get educated here stay here and contribute.  But I also believe that US efforts and money should be focused on getting more natives to graduate rather than on recruiting engineers from outside the USA.