Science education not adequately preparing pupils for world with climate change and fake news, teachers say

▶ Teachers say that curriculums in schools globally fail to prepare pupils for the real world

Seven in 10 teachers believe science education in their country is unfit for the future, according to a global report published by Oxford University Press.

Teachers voiced their concern that curriculums were failing children by not preparing them to navigate challenges such as climate change and the evolving role of technology.

“The scientific challenges of the past year with the pandemic and the ever-growing signs of climate change mean that there has never been a more important time to focus on science, empowering pupils to thrive in a changing world,” said Andreas Schleicher, the most senior education official at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

Researchers polled 398 teachers in 22 countries and regions for the study, called Evolution of Science Education. Some respondents were in the UAE, but most were in India or the UK.

Educators said children should be allowed to experiment and encouraged to engage while studying the underpinning scientific concepts. They requested a rebalancing of exams away from the current focus on knowledge and towards assessing the application of science.

Teachers said that to remain relevant, science lessons should focus on practical skills, and that a greater connection should be made between the science being taught and what was happening in the world. Covid-19 changed science teaching in the past year, particularly by restricting practical experimentation in the classroom.

But 42 per cent of teachers surveyed said the pandemic had not changed the focus of science education.

Of those polled, a quarter said climate change was the biggest challenge in the future of science education.

To ensure science teaching evolves and remains relevant in the future, teachers said, there should be a greater focus on climate change, tackling fake news and adapting more quickly to technological and societal change.

“When we were first appointed as the developer of the Pisa 2025 science framework [with the OECD] in late 2019, we could never have predicted the chaos that the pandemic would bring,” said Dave Leach, global assessment director at Oxford University Press.

“We wanted to elevate the voices of those teachers, to start a global conversation about how we enable learners to benefit from the lessons of the past 15 months, how we equip them for the challenges that lie ahead of us.”

There has never been a more important time to focus on science, empowering pupils to thrive in a changing world

ANDREAS SCHLEICHER

OECD education chief

Few scholars revel in being wrong as much as scientists do. Scientific progress would simply not be possible without an openness to debate and the idea that your life’s work might be incorrect. And this commitment to objectivity, rigour and the truth does not just benefit research. It also makes societies stronger.

That is why science has been an integral part of curriculums as far back as when Aristotle was teaching his treatises on physics and maths to young students, paving the way for modern philosophy across the Middle East and the West. Informing children about the scientific method not only gives them an understanding of how the world works, but also how to apply its ideals in their wider social lives.

And yet, according to teachers, young people today are being denied the best introduction to these values. In a study by Oxford University Press, seven out of 10 teachers said that science education in their country is not adequately preparing students for the future. A total of 398 teachers were polled across 22 countries, with most being in the UK and India.

In recent years, the UAE has been promoting Stem subjects, such as the sciences, in schools. But global shortages of people undertaking these important studies remain, particularly among girls.

At the heart of teachers’ concerns is a belief that curriculums are still overly focused on exams, and not enough on the practical use of the subject in daily life.

Science is advanced primarily in academia, but its findings matter outside the seminar rooms, academic journals and laboratories of universities. And unfortunately, in today’s world, the application of scientific progress is facing a number of challenges in wider society.

The teachers surveyed were particularly concerned about how education systems prepared young people to use it to confront humanity’s major existential challenges, including how we engage with emerging technologies and the threat posed by climate change.

The dangerous reality of warming oceans is not fully explained by data on carbon dioxide concentrations and rising sea temperatures, but also by understanding how this threatens life as we know it around the globe, politically and socially.

An especially pressing role of education today is tackling the politicisation of science. Even as a pandemic rages, face coverings are not just a safety measure, but also in many places a badge of political opinion. In the case of vaccine hesitancy, scepticism is not being driven by an academic conviction that the science behind them is wrong. It is primarily the product of fake news and the inability of social media companies to curb it, as well as institutional distrust often found among marginalised communities that have historically been neglected or discriminated against by governments.

There has rarely been a more important time to listen to scientists. It is tragic that this comes at a time when distrust in them is particularly high. There will be no eureka moment in reversing this worrying trend. Rather, governments need to start listening to the teachers who instil these values in young people.