SCIENCE EDUCATION IN INDIA

WHAT IS SCIENCE STUDY FOR?

The essence of science education is to explore, identify, discover and create more advanced possibilities to make the world a better place to live. Thus, science study should be entirely focused on innovation and value creation rather than learning the subject matter and acquiring coveted degrees without working on enhancing the existing possibilities.

Science and mathematics need to be taught like solving puzzles. Once students love to play with these unsolved mysteries and configurations, learning through critical thinking turns into a thrilling game and not a boring or forced exercise.

DRAWBACKS OF INDIAN SCIENCE STUDY

However, in India, science curriculum is imparted in schools and colleges in an incorrect way, which is the primary reason for the nation’s low invention record. Even after a lot of government initiatives, the country’s rank in Global Innovation Index 2024 has moved up to 39, behind several tiny nations such as Finland, Estonia, Iceland, Cyprus, Malta and many more. The population of these states range between 1 – 5 million, which is the size of any Indian tier II city.

Surprisingly, like humanities or commerce streams, pure science disciplines are taught in India as subjects to learn rather than a passion to discover unknown possibilities for bringing about greater benefits for mankind. What matters the most here is the intent to innovate, which is grossly missing as most learners aspire to be academic toppers. Thus, in spite of having large science education and research institutes like IITs, NITs, IISc or other engineering and medical colleges, path-breaking discoveries hardly emerge from these centres.

Indian government’s focus on inculcating an innovation mindset among school children since 2014 have had some positive impact so far. For instance, Atal Tinkering Labs in schools is harnessing critical thinking among children so that they grow up as innovators – where they question, probe and find rather than simply accept the taught theory. That apart, an I-STEM policy was launched in 2022 for promotion of holistic and multi-disciplinary research and creation of newer solutions through science, technology, engineering, mathematics.