The building “bricks” of informal STEM education: Narratives of a participatory project on aspirations for development in rural Malaysia

Anuar, Aizuddin

Abstract

In the mainstream, national development is often defined in terms of economic growth that privileges modernity, urbanization and scientific expertise. The promise of science, technology and innovation in contributing to development is reified through practices in international aid and development (Conway & Waage, 2010; Smith, 2009). In light of this, the “science for development” model (Drori, 1998) has been internalized and reflected in a national focus on science—and recently STEM—education across the Global South in the pursuit of development. Such a trend includes Malaysia, the focus of this paper.
Employing a postcolonial critique that foregrounds the ways of knowing and agency of actors side-lined by the mainstream development discourse (McEwan, 2019), this paper highlights a participatory project on “ecobricks” involving rural young people in one secondary school in Malaysia. Through preparation and participation in a STEM innovation competition organized by a public university—where I served as their mentor—these young people engaged in enacting their capacity to aspire. As a tool for young people navigating their lives, this is a capacity that can be strengthened through conscious exploration and practice
(Appadurai, 2004). Weaving ethnographic fieldnotes and interviews with the young people involved in this competition, I construct narratives of place-based, participatory informal STEM education in a rural context, engaging with Sellar & Gale’s (2011) new “structure of feeling” involving mobility, aspiration and voice. Extending this conceptualization beyond participation in higher education with the Malay concept of rasa (feeling, sensitivity, intuition), I thus portray an educative experience where rural young people grapple with questions of development and the emplaced challenges in their surroundings. Through these narratives, I argue that the future education of young people must (still) attend to the particularities of place and the skills needed to act in/on such places. This calls for modes of education that exercise their capacity to aspire through a participatory spirit, attention to lived experiences and exposure to novel encounters.

Citation

Anuar, A. (2021). The building “bricks” of informal STEM education: Narratives of a participatory project on aspirations for development in rural Malaysia.

• Conference Name: 2021 Yidan Prize Doctoral Conference
• Conference Location: Virtual, Hong Kong Time (GMT+8)
• Start Date: May 28, 2021
• End Date: May 28, 2021
• Acceptance Date: Nov 1, 2021
• Publication Date: 2021-12
• Deposit Date: Aug 22, 2023
• Publisher: Yidan Prize Foundation
• Pages: 192-205
• Series Title: Yidan Prize Conference Series: Europe 2021
• Series ISSN: 2754-1215
• Keywords: Aspiration, development, STEM education, informal education, Malaysia
• Publisher URL: https://yidanprize.org/files/Proceedings-of-the-2021-Yidan-Prize-Doctoral-Conference.pdf
• Related Public URLs: https://yidanprize.org/resource-center/knowledge-hub/yidan-prize-conference-series-europe-2021/; ; https://yidanprize.org/events/yidan-prize-conference-series-europe-2021/