UNESCO encourages us to celebrate the World Science Day for Peace and Development. It is annually held on November 10 and its purpose is to renew the international commitment to science for peace and development and to stress the responsible use of science for the benefit of society. The World Science Day for Peace and Development also aims at raising public awareness of the importance of science and to bridge the gap between science and societies.
The WSDPD's objectives are :
- To strengthen public awareness on the role of science for peaceful and sustainable societies
- To promote national and international solidarity for a shared science between countries
- To renew national and international commitment for the use of science for the benefit of societies
- To draw attention to the challenges faced by science and raise support for the scientific endeavour
In order to raise your students' awareness on the topic, you can place the official poster on your classroom walls and develop an activity that highlights the important role of Science in society. If you wish, you can use this reading comprehension activity that describes how researchers from Virginia Tech attempted to reforest post-mined soil using biochar. Teacher's notes and answers can be downloaded here. This activity is an example from www.readworks.org, an excellent website to improve students' reading comprehension skills.
I cannot end this post without sharing the UNESCO Science report towards 2030 with you. It provides more country-level information than ever before. The trends and developments in Science, Technology, innovation policy and governance between 2009 and mid-2015 described here provide essential baseline information on the concerns and priorities of countries that should orient the implementation and drive the assessment of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development in the years to come. Therefore, a must-read for Science and Technology teachers.
Happy WSDPD and let us hope that our young students become aware of the essential relation between Science and Peace and Development and fight actively for it.
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