Young scientists - Let’s try to end apathy on education

The 50th BT Young Scientist and Technology Exhibition has opened. Last year 1,200 students submitted 550 projects and over 45,000 people visited the exhibition.

The competition began when UCD physics researchers Rev Dr Tom Burke and Dr Tony Scott noticed the American version of the event — science fairs — while studying in New Mexico. Since 1963 tens of thousands of starry-eyed students have participated in what has been an inspiring event. It has encouraged scholarship and shown students that they can, with the support of good, motivated teachers, compete with and often surpass the very best of their contemporaries from right around the world. The competition has also shown that science and its application can be extraordinarily engaging, relevant and most of all, fun.

But, despite all of those hugely positive results, the competition touches just a small minority of second-level students. This is not the fault of the competition but rather the unfortunate cultural fact that far too high a percentage of Irish children drift through school, only half interested and only vaguely aware of the opportunity they have been presented with — or indeed the consequences of not taking full advantage of that enviable opportunity. For far too many children school is a rite of passage to be endured rather than the enlivening opportunity of a lifetime.