The 2002 National Youth Science Forum
Anna Robinson and Sally J. Stowe
The National Youth Science
Forum (NYSF), an annual event, was again held in
Canberra in January 2002. Co-ordinated
by a National Science Summer School Council, with representatives from Rotary,
Universities, CSIRO, the Australian Academy of Science, Australian Academy of
Technological Sciences and Engineering, industry partners and former students,
its president was ACT WISENET member, Professor Sue Serjeantson.
The NYSF aims to introduce Year 12 students to scientific research in academic and industrial environments.
It comprises 2 sessions of two weeks each; approximately 150 students attend each session. Students stay at the University of Canberra in student accommodation. They visit a number of laboratories where they have the opportunity to interact with scientists. They also have extra-curricular activities, including seminars, discussion groups and debates on controversial issues such as using animals in research, and genetically modified foods. Excursions, social and leisure activities are organised. Every student seemed to enjoy the experience enormously.
For additional information and photographs see www.nysf.edu.au .
NYSF places equal emphasis on pure research, applied research and engineering in both the physical and biological sciences. Biomedical research and biotechnology are emphasised rather than medicine, dentistry, veterinary science, pharmacy, physiotherapy or similar professions.
Anna Robinson reports: At the John Curtin School of Medical Research, we hosted two groups of 16 students from each session. I talked to 50 or so students when they visited our school; the majority was female. They wanted to know about career paths, salaries, preparation, satisfaction, difficulties, balancing children and career options, highs and lows of doing research. The males in the group were particularly interested in the time it took to become a research scientist and the income structure. I could see quite a lot losing interest as we did the sums :
If you were to start at 18, after 11 years you would be 30-ish with precious little in the bank account. AND a HECS account of approximately $10,000!
Despite the balance sheet, they all showed great interest in my research as I explained my study in Glutathione S-Transferase enzymes and their important role in our body’s detoxication mechanisms. They were also intrigued to hear about the human genome project; how genes encoding the GST enzymes could now be readily mapped to chromosomes; and the beginnings of correlation of discoveries at genetic and protein level with diseases and pathologies.
I found the whole experience extremely enjoyable and recommend it to any
WISENET members who are invited to participate.
We are always impressed by how quickly the students pick up the basics of operating half a million dollars worth of electron microscope, how fascinated they are to discover that cellular organelles can look quite different from those in the textbooks, and how well they relate what they see to what they know.
I have also been struck by the high proportion of girls in the groups we see, and I think this is tending to increase.
We both decided that Australia’s future is in very good hands and we wish that the financial benefit of the huge amount of study, self-discipline and personal sacrifice involved in becoming a scientific researcher were more realistic, even competitive with law, accountancy and politics. Perhaps as this generation comes to power, they will remember their experiences at NYSF and redress the imbalance to everyone’s advantage.