By Ashutosh Pandit & Rusen Kumar

STEM education is a modern day approach and is getting lot of attention throughout the world, especially in developing countries while developed countries have already realized the important of STEM Education and are enjoying its impact.

Addressing Socio-Economic Challenges through STEM Education

India has been facing various socio-economic challenges. The answers to these challenges are required by creating human resources equipped with an optimum set of knowledge, skills, and attitude that is committed to producing technological sophistication and interdisciplinary thinking.

Significance of STEM Education in India

In reference to India, STEM education holds great significance as it enables the students to learn in a scientific, systematic, and logical manner, and also to become future-ready. Our students need to learn, update, explore, and continuously enhance their knowledge base by various innovative ways and means. The Indian economy will need more and more new skills and a new mindset. STEM Education can convert the envisioned dreams into reality.

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Understanding India’s Emerging Challenges with STEM Education

We strongly believe that students with STEM Education will have a better understanding of India’s emerging socio-economic challenges. STEM – Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics – is the academic discipline of the modern education system.

Creating Visionaries through STEM Education

These disciplines will really help in producing visionaries, thinkers, and dreamers. STEM learners will create a new and better world, a world with knowledge, a world with wisdom, a world with peace, a world with love and care. STEM learners could be problem solvers of future India and become responsible citizens. STEM works always. It works everywhere. STEM is always good for humanity.

Importance of STEM Culture in India

The role of STEM is very important to take STEM culture ahead in the country. STEM Education will help in creating positive attitudes for the present, people, and the planet. The future and prosperity of the country are closely linked with the opportunity for learning they are getting. STEM education will be helping in making the students more responsible. Injustice is strictly linked to the unequal opportunity of education. For sustained democracy, we need creative people. Giving an opportunity for creativity is the key work of the education system. Creativity while learning promotes innovative thinking in our students.

Maximizing Learning Through STEM Education

STEM Education maximizes possible maximum involvement of a child in the entire learning process. It strengthens their understanding of basic science, engineering physics, and mathematical concepts and applies them in a variety of situations in the classroom as well as in life. It is very much helpful in developing their power of reasoning, enriches mental ability, boosts confidence, and also develops mastery over computational skills and other basic scientific processes.

Ensuring Equal Access to Education

We want to make our India stronger in every sector then we need to make STEM education available to all the students from their early stage of life – learning at schools.

Education is a fundamental right of every citizen in our country. Article 21-A in the Constitution of India provides free and compulsory education for all children in the age group of 6-14 years as their Fundamental Right.

51A, Part IVA of the Indian Constitution, specifies the list of 11 fundamental duties of the citizens. The two fundamental duties No. 8 and No. 11 are very important and these are closely linked to education and role of citizen in this regard. Fundamental duties No. 8 – it shall be the duty of every citizen of India: to develop the scientific temper, humanism and the spirit of inquiry and reform;” and fundamental duties No. 11 – it shall be the duty of every citizen of India: who is a parent or guardian, to provide opportunities for education to his child, or as the case may be, ward between the age of six and fourteen years.

Empowering Children for a Better India

Our children are responsible for creating better India. The inclusion of providing equal opportunity of education to every child as a Fundamental Right is a great step forward towards maintain human-rights and abolition of social injustices.

Collective Responsibility for STEM Education

We should all acknowledge our responsibility to perform our fundamental duties. What we believe that, in this globalized world education means STEM Education. Providing STEM Education cannot be developed in isolation. We need collective efforts to take STEM to the schools of every corner of the country. If we really want to develop scientific temperament among the citizens, we must start it with students first with special attention on rural areas. Giving equal opportunity of STEM education to every child will be a meaningful and long term investment in Skill India mission. Skilled minds and hands will be the by-products of STEM education. The beauty of STEM is giving freedom to the learners by doing and learning by themselves style.

A Call for a Nationwide STEM Initiative

India must have STEM for ALL mission. Mini Science Centre mush be established in the schools. We need to first focus on capacity building of teachers and spread awareness among parents towards application of science and technology in the modern education regime. Teachers well-equipped to impart STEM play an important role in guiding children. As the most populous with supreme diversity in talent and culture, we need a collective efforts from government and others working on education to avail the opportunity and benefits of STEM education.

How can we solve our socio-economic problem where lakhs of children are deprived of basic education? It is a fundamental questions before fellow citizens.

The best way to ensure future success it is to make sure that students must get opportunities to learn fundamental STEM education at primary school level. Building a strong STEM foundation through a compulsory curriculum is the best way to ensure that students are exposed to math, science, and technology throughout their academic career.

About the author

Ashutosh Pandit (ashutosh@stemlearning.in) is the Founder and CEO of STEM Learning Pvt. Ltd., Mumbai a Science Education Social Enterprise. His efforts have helped STEM to reach out to more than 8,50,000 students through its innovative science models and has trained more than 5000 teachers. Already science centres have been installed in 850 schools across 17 states across the country, with the aim to set up 5,000 more science centres over the next 5 years.

Rusen Kumar (editor@indiacsrnetwork.com) is the founder of India CSR Network, the largest news network in the domain of corporate sustainability & responsibility (CSR) in India.)