(For the duration of this blog, I will be assuming that "Technology" is a subset of "Science". I will use "Scientist" to refer to both)
There was an article a few weeks ago (2?) that America was falling back on science, because schoolchildren apparently don't like science very much. Now generally articles like this will have comments blaming:
1. The Government for not putting enough funding bla bla bla
2. The Education System
3. Kids these days with their laziness, and their online RPGs
4. Maths is too hard :(
But really the answer is amazingly obvious. Kids don't want to be scientists. And its not because all those letters and numbers are too hard, its because:
1. Silly Stereotypes
2. Lack of Perceived Success
Lets start with 1
When you think "Scientist" what do you think? Some boffin with crazy hair wearing a white coat.
What about a young kid who's good at maths? Those are 'nerds' - they're young kids with large glasses, braces, speech impediments, they are always prim and proper, never speak to members of opposite sex and have no social life.
Nobody wants to be like that. We want to be the cool Jocks who scores the winning [somePartOfGame]. We want to be the popular overly made up chick who has a line of men trying to woo her. We want to be the cool guys with the leather jackets who fix things by hitting them.
The irony of course is that high intelligence is one of the things which will bring you the ladies in real life (can you gu€$$ the rest?)
Now lets deal with number 2. People want to be successful in life. Measuring success is difficult. However in general the two main factors are popularity and money.
Which section of the market appears to get the most success? Its the Entertainment industry of course. People want to be these demi-gods. They don't want to be that boffin we mentioned earlier.
This is society's fault of course. We are more interested in [FilmStarX's] new hairstyle instead of the latest mathematical discovery.
Lets play a little game to prove my point shall we ?
Grab a piece of paper and divide it into two. Start with entertainment [this includes Sports]. Write the name of a famous person who has to do with the entertainment sector and an example of what he or she did.
Then write the name of someone famous in Science or Technology, and an example of what he or she did.
Lets define the "Famous" premetric threshold as "has their own wikipedia page".
Lets see how far you go
Llama
I don't think that's taking into consideration the larger spectrum of things. Yes. There's silly stereotypes about scientists. Stephen Hawking didn't help. However, that's more of an international phenomenon than an American one (and let's face facts, not to overstate the influence of my home nation, but our media and culture are ubiquitous throughout all of the industrial world and most of the third world. If it's become part of our culture it's just as likely to infect other nations the world around like McDonald's Hamburgers and Coca-cola lining your blood vessels with cholesterol and your abdomen with fat).
ReplyDeleteThe education system here *is* ridiculous here for a number of reasons. Funding is one thing, but funding tends to get misappropriated or spread unevenly. The dropout rates in urban areas are beyond belief and no amount of funding will reach students who are not in school.
Then there's the low standards on American schools. From my understanding in most European education systems there is testing done here and again that more or less determines your future outright. If you don't pay attention in school there's a good chance that you'll be mopping floors for the people who worked hard to achieve in school.
In America, the first twelve years of school are nearly meaningless. Even the worst student can spend a year and a half in community college and "catch up" and blam, now they're rubbing shoulders with the people who studied hard for their whole lives at the big university (and likely even taking a seat that could have gone to someone who worked harder for it).
That sounds egalitarian almost, that you get a blank slate to start over and achieve where you failed as a youngster, but the problem it far from encourages good behavior in students in elementary and high school. There's nothing to work for, and teachers have to accommodate students who don't want to study and have no reason to. Education has become a field by the lowest common denominator for the lowest common denominator.
The way scientists are perceived by society is far from our biggest problem.
OLAF AGREES!
ReplyDeleteIt has been far too common for puny wimps to decide the fate of barbarians! Barbarians are the greatest and strongest!
Olaf will use science and muscle power to crush the weaklings!