· Among the recommended implementation steps is the creation of a merit-based scholarship program to attract ten thousand  exceptional students to science and math teaching careers each year. 4-year scholarships, worth up to $20,000 each year, should be designed to assist some of the country's top students obtain bachelor's degrees in physical or life sciences, mathematics or engineering -- with concurrent certification as K-12 math and science teachers. After graduation, they would be required to work for a minimum of 5 years in public schools. Participants who teach in disadvantaged rural or inner-city areas would receive a $10,000 yearly bonus. Each of the ten thousand teachers would serve about one thousand students over the course of a teaching career, having an impact on ten million minds, the report says.

Sustain and strengthen the nation's commitment to long-term basic research.

· Policy-makers need to increase the national investment in basic research by ten percent each year over the next seven years. Special attention should be paid to the physical sciences, engineering, mathematics, and information sciences, and to basic research funding for the U.S. Department of Defense, the report says.

· Policy-makers also should establish within the U.S. Department of Energy an organization called the Advanced Research Project Agency -- Energy (ARPA-E) that reports to the undersecretary for science and sponsors "out-of-the-box" energy research to meet the nation's long-term energy challenges.

· Authorities should make 200 new research grants annually -- worth $500,000 each, payable over five years -- to the nation's most outstanding early-career researchers.

Best and Brightest

Develop, recruit, and retain top students, engineers and scientists from both the USA and overseas. The  US should be considered the most attractive place in the world to study and conduct research, the report says.