New curriculum and science education

Science education is the key element for the future of a nation. An effective science education during early school years should be considered as a stepping stone to produce quality higher education. We have to produce not only doctors and engineers but also quality researchers in core sciences of physics, chemistry, biology, mathematics and other fields. They will serve as drivers towards further research in sciences, engineering, home-grown technologies and in boosting our knowledge economy. If this is not done, we will remain just technology implementers and consumers rather than become creators of new science and technology.

The much-talked-about new curriculum, which will be introduced to school education from January 2024, however, does not seem to have given priority to science education. In this curriculum, there will no longer be separate streams of education for XI and X. With this drastic new reform, a ninth grader will not be able to choose a stream from science, humanities and business studies. And all students will have to study the same curriculum comprising a total of 10 common compulsory subjects. In the existing system, students are required to specialise and study in depth about their areas of interest from ninth grade. Currently, a ninth grader who has selected science as his/her preferred course of education has to study a total of 400 marks science subjects namely physics, chemistry, biology and higher mathematics. But in the new curriculum, all the subjects of science stream will be merged into 100 marks and taught as a single subject titled science.

From 2017, a student has to sit for 1300 marks in secondary school certificate (SSC) exam, where science subjects have 400 marks. And it is 31 per cent of the total marks. But in the new curriculum, students will have to study one 100-mark science subject which represents only 10 per cent of the total marks. This new curriculum may create a new problem. After studying only 100-mark science in school, a higher secondary student may not be interested in studying 800-mark science subjects in college. Higher Secondary Certificate (HSC) students now have to study 200-mark physics, 200-mark chemistry, 200-mark biology and 200-mark mathematics separately. This may decrease the number of science students in HSC and higher levels of education. The new curriculum may make students fear science rather than love the discipline. As a result, we will no longer find doctors, engineers and science researchers the way we get them now.

In many countries, students have the opportunity to decide on the subjects of their choice at the secondary level. And physics, chemistry and mathematics are taught separately, not as  an integrated science subject. Education system of China requires completion of junior secondary school between 12 and 15 years of age and students there are taught mathematics and physics separately and in detail. Similarly, the UK's secondary students can study the subjects of their choice and choose any subject related to science, arts or social science according to their choice. We need to make core science subjects popular and interesting among our school students so that they can fulfil their dream of becoming a scientist, a doctor or an engineer. The new curriculum should create schoolchildren's interest in science. But condensation of core science subjects like physics, chemistry and biology may make them indifferent to these subjects in the future.

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