WIREDGOV

Fundamental Physics Prize winner Tejinder (Jim) Virdee (Imperial and CMS) is supporting a project which will bring physics and particle physics to more secondary school students in the continent of his birth.

Improving the quality of physics teaching in sub-Saharan Africa might seem a strange aspiration when some countries may be facing far more fundamental development challenges. But that’s the point – a good understanding of physics is a pre-requisite for studying many of the subjects at university that are essential for these countries to realise their goals through the expertise and enterprise of their own countrymen and women.

Jim, who was born in Kenya, took part in a science festival organised by the BBC in Uganda earlier this year. As a result of the visit, he enabled four teachers from Uganda and Kenya to take part in CERN’s well-established summer programme for international teachers. The aim is that these four teachers will now transfer their knowledge and enthusiasm to other science teachers, as well as their students.

Jim is working with the Institute of Physics to support on-going projects in nine sub-Saharan countries. The IOP’s programmes not only address teacher professional development, but also provide the participants with experimental equipment to enable them to teach physics in a more exciting way. By making the subject more dynamic, the hope is that more students will study physics at university and then be equipped with the knowledge and skills to exploit and develop ideas that will take their countries forward.

You can learn more about Jim’s project through an excellent documentary first broadcast on the BBC World Service.

Who says that the discovery of a Higgs boson doesn’t change lives?

CERN is not the only big science project inspiring people in Africa – nine African countries (as well as Australia) will be hosting antennae for SKA, the world’s largest radio telescope.

This article first appeared in Issue 29: 24 September 2013, UK news from CERN.