The new Junior Cert science course could help to stop the rot and tempt more students into the subject - if they can get access to adequate laboratory facilities, writes Dick Ahlstrom Science Correspondent

So near and yet so far. We have a new Junior Cert science curriculum that promises much, but too many pupils cannot participate.

The new programme is meant to reflect the modern realities of teaching science. In particular, this means doing fewer things by rote and learning more through direct hands-on experimentation. Yet too many of our pupils will see no benefit from this new curriculum.

Unfortunately, it all seems to come down to the dirty business of money. Some schools just do not have the cash to provide useable laboratory space where experiments can be conducted safely. Others lack the dedicated teaching capacity to pursue the science curriculum to its fullest.

More are caught in the battle between the Association of Secondary Teachers, Ireland (ASTI) and the Department of Education and Science (DES) as they continue to grind away at one another. ASTI is the only secondary school teachers' union to refuse to introduce the new curriculum, even in those schools that have the wherewithal to carry it through.

How many pupils are blocked from the benefits of the new curriculum? That is still a mystery. The Department of Education and Science could shed no light on the issue.

Although the new curriculum is now active, schools have until October 31st to decide whether to use the new or old curriculum. That still leaves plenty of time for ASTI to modify its views, so perhaps schools that are not teaching the curriculum now may do so by the end of October.

So until that time there is limited information about this new form of disadvantage being introduced into our school system.

So what are these children missing by remaining with the rote methods of the past? What is the big deal about being able to actually do the experiments yourself? Not getting access to the new curriculum could mean the difference between choosing a career in science and choosing the ever-popular areas of commerce, arts or medicine.

It is not that there is anything wrong with any of these career options. It is just that we are not in short supply of BComm's or BA's or doctors. We are, however, near crisis point in the dramatic fall-off in the number of students who choose to do science on completion of their Leaving Cert.

Entry to third level science degree programmes requires about 350 points, sometimes less. Arts and Commerce are both in the 400s, and both involve curriculums that many argue are far less demanding.

We are not unique as regards the decline in science. OECD countries around the world are struggling to keep students engaged in the sciences, and it is proving a serious uphill struggle. Students are abandoning the sciences as never before.

Who cares so long as we have an educated workforce, some would argue. Yet having a good general education alone is not sufficient to drive the knowledge-based economy now sought by the Government. This new economy is based on brainpower and innovation, most of it coming directly from scientific research.

This new economic format, being pursued by advanced economies around the world, is all about creativity and new knowledge which can be applied to the betterment of society, the creation of jobs and wealth production through innovation. The only problem is you cannot play the game unless you have the team, and this team is largely made up of science graduates. What do you do if you haven't got any science graduates?

This is the challenge as we attempt to transform ourselves into a knowledge-driven economy. We need more, not fewer, science graduates if we want to develop local innovation, and this is where the new science curriculum comes into play.

Rightly, a great effort is being made to transform the junior cycle, hoping to get youngsters interested in science and get them engaged early. By the time the senior cycle rolls around career paths are too often set, and science, as recent history has shown, is usually not on the road-map.

There was little to inspire in the old curriculum, based as it was on memory, rote and drilling. There were experiments, but too much of this science curriculum was a drudge, something that students could immediately write off as boring old stodge.

The new curriculum is not necessarily going to set students alight, and science subjects will always remain a minority sport, but at least it might stop the rot and tempt a few more students back into the sciences. It includes a package of 30 mandatory experiments that must be done by students in groups no bigger than two.

But what will this mean to the students? Potentially quite a lot.

Doing is always more fun and engaging that watching. Students will be able to mix the chemicals, slice up the microscope tissues and do the conductivity experiments. The greater hands-on emphasis might just be enough to bring back a bit of the adventure, mystery and discovery that typifies the reality of scientific research.

The new curriculum does not have to produce 10,000 new science acolytes a year, although that would be nice. It just has to spark the curiosity of a few hundred more than we get today and encourage them to stick with the sciences when they come to sit the Leaving Certificate.

We won't really know whether the new junior-cycle curriculum can deliver until we see what impact it has when this year's students reach the Leaving Cert.

The alternative, of course, is to do nothing until we eventually run out of students interested in the sciences, by which time the high-tech industries will have departed our shores and the dream of a knowledge-based economy will have proven to be a short-lived flash in the pan.