<p>Looking at the article about the survey, they say there’s an expected shortage of 70,000 engineers by 2010, per the NSF and National Academy of Sciences. </p>
<p>This quote made me wonder about the methodology. </p>
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<p>The teens in the survey were ages 8 to 17. I’d bet that there are a lot of teen and tween girls who are saying that yes, their parents have encouraged them to be actresses, because that’s what those girls WANT to hear their parents saying to them. There’s nothing in the article about what the parents are actually saying to the kids, which might be quite different. If the pollster reached my 12 year old, who is bitten hard by the acting bug, I’m sure she’d be talking about wanting to be an actress and how her parents “encouraged” it, which in reality means that we are talking about how acting ability comes into play in a whole variety of careers like teaching, sales, and advocacy. At the same time, she’d probably forget all of the times her parents have pointed out things she’s done that indicate she’d be a good scientist.</p>