Portable laboratory for schools unveiled in Vizag

All the apparatuses and experiments are up to CBSE and NCERT standards and can be used across the syllabi.

Bala Bhaskar and Chakradhar of Genius Edu Labs explaining the functioning of the Nano Science Lab after its launch in Visakhapatnam on Thursday. Photos: C. V. Subrahmanyam

For the vast majority of today’s students, in urban schools as well as rural, a well-equipped chemistry lab is a dream. Most of them go through schooling learning theory but never having conducted experiments in a lab.

To address this longstanding problem, city-based company Genius Edu Labs (GEL) has developed a portable lab that stocks reagents and equipment sufficient for classroom experiments for a year.

Demonstrating the Nano Science Lab here on Thursday, GEL Managing Director Bala Bhaskar and academic adviser Chakradhar said it was the first-of-its-kind lab in India and could be the solution to the main problem besetting our education system, reliance on theory rather than practicals. The Nano Science Lab can perform 250 activities in physics and chemistry, covering syllabi of various boards. It comes with a manual that gives step-by-step guidance.

What it has?

The portable unit has two wings, one dedicated to physics and the other to chemistry. It comes packed with consumables in enough quantity to teach 500 students for a whole academic year. Most of the containers are unbreakable and only a few acids require inert glass containers.

“All the apparatuses and experiments are up to CBSE and NCERT standards and can be used across syllabi,” Mr. Chakradhar explained.

The laboratory comes equipped with safety material like gloves, safety goggles, and lab apron. The Nano Science Lab also has a working area at the back of the unit to enable the teacher to conduct experiments anywhere.

There is a plastic board to which the demonstrator can temporarily fix experiments like circuit boards to hold them up for students to see.

“Genius Edu Labs conducts a three-day training programme for teachers on using the unit,” Mr. Bala Bhaskar said.

GEL Executive Director Sucharita said the company wanted to take the lab to two lakh schools by 2016.

Inaugurating the lab, S. Vijay Kumar, chairman of Vijay Nirman, said it would help teach fundamentals better and inculcate an aptitude for science in students.

Andhra University English Medium School Correspondent B. Prasada Rao, who received the first lab, described it as a “rare gift” and said it would rid schools of rote learning.