[IRTalk] A new way to equip Africa’s science labs: get students to build their own

[Ina Smith]

https://theconversation.com/a-new-way-to-equip-africas-science-labs-get-students-to-build-their-own-100792


“The critical importance of conducting practical experiments as well as learning theory sets science education apart from many other taught courses. The value of this practical training is two-fold: first, it provides an in-depth understanding of the biological systems that are being studied. Second, the practice of science in industry or academia is essentially a practical undertaking. Any graduate wishing to work as a scientist must have a good grasp of how to conduct experiments and produce data.

While there are increasing amounts of often free educational resources available online: videos, Massive Open Online Courses, papers and tutorials, they can’t make up for students getting their hands dirty – so to speak – at the lab bench

To truly understand their discipline, students need the opportunity to interact with laboratory equipment through practical instruction<http://www.gettingpractical.org.uk/documents/EmmaWoodleyarticle.pdf>. Learning how to conduct experiments and deal with both the successes and failures of bench science is an important part<http://sites.nationalacademies.org/cs/groups/dbassesite/documents/webpage/dbasse_073330.pdf> of developing as a scientist. The skills that students develop through practical experiments are also fundamental for progressing into successful graduate studies and research careers.”

“During the Zimbabwe LabHack teams of students from four universities, as well as local hobbyists and one high school team, demonstrated their prototypes for low cost laboratory equipment built out of locally-available hardware.

All the teams were interdisciplinary, which was important not only for design issues but also offered a means of building strong links for future collaborations.

The teams were asked to design one of three types of basic but crucial lab equipment: a magnetic stirrer, a polymerase chain reaction machine, and a centrifuge.

There was also an open challenge for students to build other types of equipment that would be used in teaching their specific discipline of science. In this category entries included a digital microscope and a bioprocessor, which is used for culturing cells.

Each team was supplied with an Arduino kit, a single-board microcontroller that allows the equipment to be programmable. Apart from that they were self-funded and used easily available local resources. No team spent more than $100 on their final designs – a clear demonstration of how innovative thinking can produce highly inventive, working prototypes.

The teams also participated in a range of workshops hosted by local tech companies, which exposed students to emerging technologies like 3D printing and 3D scanning. Having these companies present their working models for tech-driven job creation in Zimbabwe also illustrated the possibilities of creating tech start-ups for possible future career choices.”
Ina Smith
Project Manager: African Open Science Platform<http://africanopenscience.org.za/>
Academy of Science of South Africa (ASSAf)
DOAJ Ambassador, Southern Africa Region<https://blog.doaj.org/2016/09/07/the-doaj-ambassadors-biographies/>
LIASA Librarian of the Year 2016<https://loy2016blog.wordpress.com/>

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