Climate change: Sir Harold Kroto calls for internet education

The Times
May 27, 2009

Frank Pope

Fighting climate change will take more than a technological revolution, according to Professor Sir Harold Kroto. A new era of science education is also needed.
“There’s no point in looking for The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse in the future. They’re already here, and climate change is only one of them,” Sir Harold told The Times. “There are two ways of solving the problem. One is scientific; the other is changing public attitudes.”
Sir Harold — whose passion for organic chemistry led him to discover “buckyballs” (a new form of carbon) and won him the 1996 Nobel Prize for Chemistry — believes that science is being inadequately taught across the world, with the possible exception of China and India.
In the West, science graduates are lured into higher-paying jobs, and fewer students are coming up through the ranks, he says. “Let’s make the most of the teachers we’ve got.”

Sir Harold, 69, has been amassing the best teaching material and making it available online to teachers around the world. Although his fellow Nobel Laureates feature on his two websites (www.vega.org and www.geoset.info , soon to be merged) he insists that the project doesn’t require geniuses, but those with passion. “This is where the revolution of the internet is,” he says. “Out there are a million people with a passion for some personal topic, and the desire altruistically to make it available. By making it available on a global scale you cover all bases.”
Working with universities to create the content, Sir Harold’s plan relies on broadband reaching far-flung communities. “If there’s a satellite dish in the village it must be possible to get internet to the teacher,” he says. “Our last hope is education, changing people’s behaviour.”