Through this awareness week, students got to see various scientific demonstrations. Source: IIT Gandhinagar
Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Gandhinagar has organised a week-long Science Awareness Programme for more than 800 students of classes XI and XII from the Ahmedabad and Gandhinagar regions.
Students readily participated in the Science Awareness Programme activities on the IIT Gandhinagar campus from 8 am to 2 pm. The programme will be on till February 25.
The event is aimed at popularising STEM learning (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) among school students with hands-on activities, and inspiring them to pursue careers in various fields of STEM.
IIT Gandhinagar students from various disciplines are actively contributing to the event by volunteering in scientific demonstrations and guiding students during lab visits.
A part of the central government’s Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav to commemorate 75 years of independence, the event is funded by the Department of Science & Technology (DST) under the STUTI (Synergistic Training programme Utilizing the Scientific and Technological Infrastructure) scheme.
Through this awareness week, students got to see various scientific demonstrations such as fire without matchstick, production of Oxygen, disappearing Styrofoam, non-Newtonian fluids using corn-flour, the explosion of ping pong balls using Liquid Nitrogen, demonstration of earthquake building models, Electromagnetism, Hall effect, wire loop game, characteristics of dry ice, invisible glass, peeking inside the diaper and the concept of hydrogel, principles of complexation, elephant’s toothpaste and oxidation-reduction among others. Students also visited the IIT Gandhinagar laboratories and the Sports Complex.
Aastha Rawat, a Class XII Science student from Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya, Gandhinagar, said, “I really enjoyed this visit to IIT Gandhinagar and various labs. We could see so many scientific demonstrations in-person and learnt a lot.”
Anand and Himanshu, two classmates of Class XI (Science) from Kendriya Vidyalaya Ahmedabad Cantonment, said, “It felt fantastic to visit new labs here and get to see theories from textbooks translating into actual scientific experiments. We enjoyed attempting the wire loop game.”
Emphasising the significance of such exposure for school students, Uzma Khan, a Chemistry teacher from Kendriya Vidyalaya 1, Gandhinagar, said, “This programme and each and every experiment being demonstrated here is truly stimulating. It is important for students to see that Science can be so interesting and exciting when learnt outside textbooks. It can ignite students’ curiosity and motivate them to explore more.”