Over a hundred school students saw their textbook lessons take a practical form as the District Collector launched on Saturday Naalaiya Vignani (Tomorrow's Scientist), a joint initiative by the Regional Science Centre, Namma Kovai and Mango Education, on science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) in the city.
Fifty students of classes III-X from the Vellankurichi Government Higher Secondary School along with two teachers and 60 of classes III-VIII from the Literacy Mission Matriculation School with nine teachers attended the first session on gravity and magnetism.
This was for all government, government-aided, and private school students, to develop their efficiency using over 170 STEM-based physical models, an official from the district administration said. The programme would go on throughout the year, except for three days and a schedule would be prepared to train and hold quiz contests for 100 students a day.
District Science Officer (in-charge) at the Regional Science Centre I.K. Lenin Tamil Kovan said volunteers would to be roped in from corporate companies. They would be trained and monitored by the Mango Education team. So far, 20 were trained, who would in turn train 100 more volunteers, he said. The centre was open to students from kindergarten to higher secondary, but the target audience would be middle school (classes VI-IX) students, he added.
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Officials said the centre would conduct exhibitions and open the planetarium on days when the sky was clear, for the public to learn about STEM as well.
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