President Bush has selected D. Allen Bromley, a prominent nuclear physicist from Yale University, as his science adviser, the White House announced last week.
The adviser, who directs the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, is responsible for providing expertise on a broad range of scientific and technical issues, including science education.
At a recent Senate hearing, the science advisers to three former Presidents cited the “crisis” in science education as one of the most critical problems facing the field.
Leaders of several science groups, who had criticized President Reagan for reducing the post’s prominence, had expressed frustration4over President Bush’s delay in naming an adviser and urged him to upgrade the status of the office.
In a report issued earlier this year, for example, the Carnegie Commission on Science, Technology, and Government, a group of 21 leading scientists and policymakers, urged that the science adviser’s post be elevated to that of assistant to the President.
The group recommended that the aide “handle science and technology questions relating to policy directions, budgetary choices, the organization of the Executive Office staff, and the identification and review of candidates for major Presidential appointments to science and technology posts in the executive branch.”
