To improve science and mathematics education for American children, the White House is recruiting Elmo and Big Bird, video game programmers and thousands of scientists.

President Obama announced on Monday a campaign to enlist companies and nonprofit groups to spend money, time and volunteer effort to encourage students, especially in middle and high school, to pursue science, technology, engineering and math.

“You know the success we seek is not going to be attained by government alone,” Mr. Obama said kicking off the initiatives. “It depends on the dedication of students and parents, and the commitment of private citizens, organizations and companies. It depends on all of us.”

Mr. Obama, accompanied by students and a robot that scooped up and tossed rocks, also announced an annual science fair at the White House.

“If you win the N.C.A.A. championship, you come to the White House,” he said. “Well, if you’re a young person and you’ve produced the best experiment or design, the best hardware or software, you ought to be recognized for that achievement, too.

“Scientists and engineers ought to stand side by side with athletes and entertainers as role models, and here at the White House, we’re going to lead by example. We’re going to show young people how cool science can be.”

The campaign, called Educate to Innovate, focuses mainly on activities outside the classroom. For example, Discovery Communications has promised to use two hours of the afternoon schedule on its Science Channel cable network for commercial-free programming geared toward middle school students.

Science and engineering societies are promising to provide volunteers to work with students in the classroom, culminating in a National Lab Day in May.

The MacArthur Foundation and technology industry organizations are giving out prizes in a contest to develop video games that teach science and math.

“The different sectors are responding to the president’s call for all hands on deck,” John P. Holdren, the White House science adviser, said in an interview last week.

The other parts of the campaign include a two-year focus on science on “Sesame Street,” the venerable public television children’s show, and a Web site, connectamillionminds.com, set up by Time Warner Cable, that provides a searchable directory of local science activities. The cable system will contribute television time and advertising to promote the site.

The White House has also recruited Sally K. Ride, the first American woman in space, and corporate executives like Craig R. Barrett, a former chairman of Intel, and Ursula M. Burns, chief executive of Xerox, to champion the cause of science and math education to corporations and philanthropists.

Dr. Ride said their role would be identifying successful programs and then connecting financing sources to spread the successes nationally. “The need is funding,” she said. “There is a lot of corporate interest and foundation interest in this issue.”

Administration officials say that the breadth of participation in Educate to Innovate is wider than in previous efforts, which have failed to produce a perceptible rise in test scores or in most students’ perceptions of math and science. In international comparison exams, American students have long lagged behind those in much of Asia and Europe.

But some education experts said the initiatives did little to address some core issues: improving the quality of teachers and the curriculum.

“I think a lot of this is good, but it is missing more than half of what needs to be done,” said Mark S. Schneider, a vice president at the American Institutes for Research, a nonprofit research organization in Washington. “It has nothing to do with the day-to-day teaching,” said Dr. Schneider, who was the commissioner of education statistics at the Department of Education from 2005 to 2008.

Dr. Holdren said the initiatives, which are financed almost entirely by the participating companies and foundations and not the government, complement the Race to the Top program of the Department of Education, which will dispense $4.35 billion in stimulus financing to states for innovative education programs. The Race to the Top rules give extra points to applications that emphasize science, technology, engineering and mathematics, the so-called STEM subjects.

“The president has made it very clear it is a big priority,” Dr. Holdren said.

In April, Mr. Obama, speaking at the National Academy of Sciences, promised a “renewed commitment” that would move the United States “from the middle to the top of the pack in science and math over the next decade.”

To achieve this goal, Mr. Obama talked of “forging partnerships.” Monday’s announcement contains the first wave of such partnerships, officials said.

(www.eduwo.com, Jainlyn&Charlotte)