science education and communication in india

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Science Education and Communication in India Rajasee Ray VCD401

Introduction: Science Communication – A Background "I do not think it is possible for India to be really independent unless she is a technically advanced country. I am not thinking for the moment in terms of just scientific growth. In the present context of the world we cannot even advance culturally without a strong background of scientific research in every department." Jawaharlal Nehru, in a letter to Gandhi, 1945[1] India, a country that entered the latter half of the 20th century with a forward-thinking growth policy, led by the first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, is today a nation of 1.2 billion people [2], who speak more than 1600 different languages and dialects, live mostly in rural agrarian communities, facing various problems of overpopulation, environmental degradation, poverty, disease, malnutrition and social unrest. Against this background, science education and communication is viewed partly as a nation-building catalyst, that will lead the country’s youth into the coming era of technology – and partly as a mass awareness drive, in the words used by various Science Communication Societies across the nation: “to popularize science and the scientific temper among the Indian masses.” [4] Consequently, science communication in India follows two very distinct routes. The first is institutional. The NCSTC, or the National Council for Science and Technology Communication, established in 1980, is the government body that works through mass communication and the education system. It is a part of the Department of Science and Technology and conducts various science communication programmes with students, schools and educators and publishes newsletters, gives away science communication awards and produces various films on science, scientists and technology. [5] The second route is that of non-governmental science communication societies and organizations and individual science communicators and journalists. Various individuals and organizations across the nation exist and work at micro and macro levels, also publishing books and newsletters and conducting science communication programmes in different localities and with different kinds of people of all age groups. Part One: Science Communication at School Level Schooling is compulsory in India, although roughly 25% of the population is illiterate, as of 2008 [6]. 80% of the schools in the country are government schools [7], but 27% of the schoolchildren in the country are educated in private schools [8]. This is because of a nationwide agreement that government school education is far inferior to private school education. The NCERT (National Council of Educational Research and Training) [9] is responsible for setting the school curriculum in India. Science as a subject is given primary importance, although it does not appear by itself in the school curriculum till


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