Stefan Mileschin

Researchers from Intel seem to have found why there are shortages of IT engineers.

Most kids don't know what a engineer is, and this is one of the stumbling blocks to encouraging more students to major in engineering.

A survey of teens by Chipzilla found that nearly a third didn't know of potential job opportunities in engineering and 13 percent did not think that majoring in engineering in college would lead to greater job opportunities.

After being told about the impact on the world that engineers had made, they started to get all enthusiastic and used words like "cool".

Fifty-three percent were more likely to consider engineering after learning about the role of engineers in the development of music and video games. Half of the teens did not know that engineers made driving, texting, and social networking possible.

However, most of them rather liked the engineer's salary which is an average annual income of $75,000.

And more than half liked the fact that the unemployment rate among engineers is over four percentage points lower than the national rate.

Intel CIO Diane Bryant said that teens needed to know more about engineering and had to be offered real-world, hands-on engineering experience and interaction with engineers. If they did, it would improve the likelihood that they'll get hooked on the subject and pursue it in college.

http://news.techeye.net/chips/intel-...an-engineer-is