1990s to 2000s · Science & Technology
America COMPETES Act
Should the government bet taxpayer money on science and STEM education to keep America competitive?
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Lesson 01 · Unlocked
Can America invent its way to a stronger future?
1. The Backstory
By the early 2000s, something was bothering scientists, universities, and business leaders alike: other countries were pouring money into science, technology, and engineering education, and the United States' long lead wasn't guaranteed to last. A widely read National Academies report, Rising Above the Gathering Storm, put the worry in stark terms, and Congress folded many of its recommendations into a bill.
Put yourself in Congress in 2007. You have limited money and a choice: spend some of it now on scientists, teachers, and labs, betting it pays off decades later, or don't.
That's the whole debate in one sentence. Everything below is Congress trying to answer it.
Learning objectives, by the end, students should be able to:
- Explain why Congress passed the America COMPETES Act
- Identify several things the law actually tried to do
- Connect education, research, and economic competitiveness
- Tell the difference between authorizing money and appropriating it
- Weigh both sides of the "should government fund science" debate
2. What Does It Do?
COMPETES wasn't one program. It was a bet placed in three places at once.
Research
Fund the labs
Major funding increases for the National Science Foundation, NIST, and the Department of Energy's Office of Science, the agencies that fund research most people never see happen.
Education
Build the pipeline
Money for STEM teacher training and undergraduate science education, because a scientist has to be a student first. Education policy, treated as economic policy.
Risk taking
Create ARPA‑E
A new agency, modeled on the Pentagon's DARPA, built to fund energy ideas too risky for a private company to gamble on, but potentially transformative if they work.
3. "Authorized" Doesn't Mean "Spent"
Congress authorized $300 million for ARPA-E in its first year. That number sounds final. It isn't. Here's the distinction that trips up most adults, let alone students. Click the card to flip it.
Authorization
Your parents say, "You can spend up to $50 on a jacket." That's permission to spend, up to a limit.
Appropriation
Now they actually hand you the money, maybe $50, maybe only $30. That's what you actually get to spend.
Permission to spend money is not the same as spending it. With COMPETES, actual funding often landed below what was authorized. Passing a law doesn't guarantee every line in it happens exactly as written.
4. Think & Discuss
Give the class this scenario: Congress has an extra $1 billion. You must decide what to do with it. Have students pick one and defend it: science labs, STEM teacher training, incentives for tech companies, or just paying down debt.
Then raise the stakes: what if the investment won't show results for 10 to 20 years? Does anyone change their answer?
5. Activity: Build America's Innovation Budget
Split students into small "Congressional committees." Each gets $100 billion to spend across six categories. Every dollar spent one place is a dollar that can't go anywhere else. Try it yourself below.
Total budget
$0B / $100B
Sent to Congress
$15B
$15B
$20B
$15B
$15B
$10B
Adjust the sliders until your committee's budget adds up to exactly $100B.
6. Arguments in Congress
Present both sides as genuine philosophies, not a right answer and a wrong one.
The case for investment
- Scientific discoveries benefit the whole country, not just whoever funded them
- Some research is too expensive or risky for private companies alone
- Better STEM education builds a more capable workforce
- Other countries are investing heavily, so falling behind has a cost
The case for caution
- Every federal dollar comes from taxpayers or borrowing
- Government isn't always good at picking which technologies will win
- Private markets and universities may allocate money more efficiently
- Authorizing a program doesn't guarantee it gets funded, or works
Discussion question: where should government investment end and private investment begin? There isn't one required answer. Students have to defend theirs.
Teacher tip
This section plays well as a quick Family Feud style round. Split the class into a "For" team and an "Against" team. Before revealing the lists above, ask each team to shout out as many reasons as they can for their side in 60 seconds. Award a point for every answer that matches something on the board, and a bonus point if they name one you hadn't listed but can defend. It turns a two sided debate into something closer to a game, and it tends to pull in the students who go quiet during open discussion.
7. Where It Shows Up Today
2007 isn't ancient history. The industries COMPETES tried to strengthen are the ones students already hear about constantly:
Artificial intelligenceRoboticsRenewable energy
Electric vehiclesBatteriesSemiconductors
SpaceflightBiotechnology
COMPETES didn't invent any of these industries by itself. That's the real question worth asking: can students tell the difference between government funding causing a breakthrough and government funding simply helping create the conditions where one became possible?
8. Vocabulary
- STEM
- Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics.
- R&D
- Work intended to create new knowledge, products, or processes.
- Competitiveness
- A country's ability to hold its own economically against others.
- Innovation
- Developing or applying new ideas and technologies.
- Authorization
- Legislation creating a program and setting a maximum funding level.
- Appropriation
- Legislation that actually hands an agency money to spend.
9. Exit Ticket
- What problem was the America COMPETES Act trying to solve?
- Name one way the law tried to solve it.
- Complete the sentence: "If I were in Congress in 2007, I would have the America COMPETES Act because ."
🃏
Back to the game. You passed the America COMPETES Act. But legislation isn't the end of the story. Congress still has to fund it, agencies have to run it, and future Congresses can change it all again.
The Bill Card is the vote. The Big Book of Bills is what happens after it.