BENGALURU: Thousands thronged the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) on Saturday eager to learn about the premier institution and its various departments on the much-awaited IISc Open Day. As many as 30,000 people, including families and droves of school students, used the opportunity to participate in several activities and listen to experts on several topics in a fun and fulfilling way.
“This is my first visit to IISc and it was fun. I was exposed to new things and it helped a lot, especially with experiments being conducted around the campus. It helped give me a better perspective on what I am studying,” a Class 10 student of PKS School, Sampigehalli, told TNIE.
Teachers also had a field day ferrying students from stall to stall within the large sprawling campus. All departments and centres had set up stalls near their respective buildings, displaying their most prominent research works. This included displays and live demos from various departments, like the mechanical engineering department’s water-jet demo, as well as various talks, experiments and competitions, including a drone competition.
“It was an eye-opener for students as they were exposed to different subjects like physics, chemistry and biology. For example, they are currently studying a chapter on the human brain, so coming here and talking to people from the Centre of Neuroscience helped them relate to their classes more,” a teacher told TNIE.
The Open Day seemed to stoke the need for scientific knowledge over everything else, as children as young as 5 were seen looking at preserved specimens of animals used as a way to educate them on infectious diseases. “So far, none of the children have been scared to see specimens of rats, mice or even cattle. On the contrary, they are very curious to understand how diseases affect the lungs, or other organs of an animal, so the response has been very good,” said Dr Shastry, a veterinarian and one of the facility managers at IISc.