Kroto's Article Redux

Recently a post on this blog pointed to a very interesting article by the Nobel prize winner, and "heroes in science" contributor, Harry Kroto. I had already read the article by Harry Kroto, and I think that it contains a very powerful warning signal for the educational and political establishment in all of the Western world. Let's not kid ourselves into believing that the situation in Iceland is any better than the one in the UK. Judging by the figures that were published in Morgunblaðid a while ago the popularity of science is low here too.

I have to correct the writer of that post on one point. Kroto worked for 37 years at the University of Sussex, my British alma mater, not the University of Reading. (Harry Kroto was still at Sussex when I was working there.) The University of Reading was mentioned in Harry Kroto's article because it recently closed its physics department. 

I asked my former PhD supervisor, who unlike Harry Kroto is still a professor at Sussex, what he thought of Harry Kroto's article. Here is the gist of his reply.

•  The situation is even worse than Kroto describes. At high school fewer and fewer people are taking any kind of A-level science, and even in the earlier GCSE level courses the kind of science being taught is being watered down (called "21st century science").   
• At A-levels pupils are allowed an arbitrary choice  between a large number of subjects, and of course they opt for the allegedly easier ones.
• Kroto blames the VCs for a lot of the problems associated with science in universities, but in many cases their hands are tied. Universities are now simply businesses. If you go into the red you fold. So why spend money on building up science departments when you can easily attract hundreds of students in psychology and sociology?

Universities can certainly learn something from the business world, but please let's not get carried away. Let's keep in mind that a university is a different kettle of fish from, and serves a very different purpose than, a money machine. 

One of the biggest battles we have in front of us is to convince the general public and the younger generations that their future is in science and that, as Kroto cogently writes, the inquiring mindset is the most important, intrinsically human quality we possess. Let's fight!

Athugasemdir

[Arnar Palsson (IP-tala skráð) 30.5.2007 kl. 15:54]

Luca

Thanks for spotting the factual error in my post, and by following up on the discussion. The comments from your colleague at the University of Sussex are particularly interesting.

Keep up the good work.

Cheers Arnar