Egyptian students are now being recognised for their scientific inventions as part of a programme to encourage young people to interest themselves in science, writes Sarah Eissa From a toy that delights kids to a mask that could save people's lives: in only 30 minutes Mahmoud Abul- Hassan, 13, turned a remote-controlled toy car into a mask that kills microbes. His invention only cost him LE4.5. "I removed the car's motor and installed a small lamp inside the mask. I linked this to batteries via an on-off button to operate the lamp. When the lamp is on, it warms the air and kills microbes, preventing them from entering the body," Abul-Hassan explains. Abul-Hassan was inspired by a school lesson that explained that heat could kill microbes. He wants to be a scientist when he grows up and looks towards Egyptian chemist Ahmed Zuweil as a role model. According to Rania Fathi, his science teacher, Abul- Hassan's mask could be an important invention, especially since many people walk in fear of catching swine flu. "The mask could protect the respiratory system from infection, since it kills microbes," she said, adding that regular unheated masks only decrease the numbers of microbes entering the human body, whereas Abul-Hassan's invention could kill all of them. Abul-Hassan's school has a society that the school has set up to encourage students. Some students may not know that they have hidden talents, Fathi explains, and the aim of the club is to help them to discover their potential. When she comes across talented students in class, she says, she encourages them to join the club. "As I explain the material in class, I require the students to conduct experiments. I can usually tell the really bright ones from the way they respond to this practical work," Fathi says. The school's headteacher, Aziza Zikri, is also head of the science department at Abul-Hassan's school, and she adds that the idea of a society for talented students goes back a long way. The idea of the club is to let the students show their talents, she says, and to encourage them to continue with their work so later they can make great inventions. "Teachers encourage their students to join the club," Zikri adds, and Fathi gives a further example. "At the beginning of the year, I explained what an electric circuit is and how motors, dynamos and batteries can be used as components in such circuits. The students really took to the idea and went on to experiment with different electric circuits. My mission as a teacher is to explain and tell them how to use things. They do the rest." If a student has an idea not directly related to the material in hand, Fathi says that it is still important to provide a venue in the school in which they can work on it. This is a way of fostering creativity among the students, Fathi adds, an essential part of education. She sends the names of talented students to the school's main branch, and students often then transfer there to work on their projects and to explain them to the members of the Centre for Talented Students' Welfare (CTSW), affiliated to the Ministry of Education. Representatives of the ministry then look at the work submitted by the students, examining the equipment used and the cost, including issues such as sustainability, and eventually choosing the really good ideas from those submitted. Omar Kamal, 12, has designed a robot that makes use of changes in forms of energy, as well as a seismograph to detect earthquakes. "We all thought Omar's robot would win the judges' award, but in fact it was the seismograph that was selected," Fathi comments. It is a simple design, she says, that has practical uses in detecting earthquakes. "The equipment is placed on a table or flat surface, and if an earthquake occurs it detects it and a light comes on." When small tremors occur before major earthquakes the equipment can detect them, helping people to take precautions in the expectation of more serious tremors to come. At present, the school's club has 10 student members, though all the students are encouraged to participate, even if they do not have an invention to submit for evaluation. "Last year, the student members of the club came up with some amazing inventions, things that could be awarded a patent if they were developed further," Zikri says. "This year, the club has been particularly active, with many very gifted students." Besides presenting their work at the school science exhibition, members present their work at other national exhibitions, showing off their inventions and the recognition certificates they have been awarded. At the moment, the students themselves pay the cost of the equipment used for their work. If it is large and more costly, more than one student will work on the project and divide the cost. Fathi also helps, though she says that cost in itself is not necessarily the key to recognition or to a good invention. In fact, many of the ideas that are picked out for special recognition are those that are the simplest and cheapest to produce. "Some of the participating students are not necessarily brilliant at science. However, their participation encourages them to show more interest and in many cases to end up loving science," Fathi says. "Even if students don't invent anything themselves, they will end up appreciating science and the ways scientists work." However, Abul-Hassan is definitely one of the more gifted students. According to his mother, Mona El-Bahtimi, he was always interested in things even before he started school, using his imagination to create new ways of doing things. "He has always loved making things with blocks and meccano, not being much interested in video games," El-Bahtimi said. He began entering school competitions when he was still in early primary school, and later his talent was discovered when he started to take classes with Fathi. El-Bahtimi was always careful about the toys she used to buy him, choosing science sets in which the energy from a potato is used to operate a clock, for example. In previous school competitions he invented an elevator, filter, electric circuit, and car and airplane that operate using solar energy, the latter invention winning the club's prize. His science teachers encourage him and the other students, something with which Hassan enthusiastically agrees. Fathi says that her next project is to try to help the students see their ideas being turned into products that can be sold on the market, though she admits that this is some way away at present. Like any mother, El-Bahtimi is full of wishes for her son, one of them being that someone will recognise her son's talents and his gift for scientific invention. Meeting someone like Egyptian Nobel Prize-winner Zuweil would be a dream for her son, she says. "I am not saying that he will ever be as famous as Zuweil," El-Bahtimi says, "but I am convinced that if he has the opportunity he will be able to use his brains for the benefit of humanity." As for Zikri, she also has wishes for her students' development. "At the moment, Egypt is far behind other countries when it comes to science. We would like to see the government paying more attention to the teaching of the subject in schools and to encouraging students. Many young people are turning away from science and choosing to study easier subjects instead. But we cannot just ignore science. On the contrary, we need to encourage it," Zikri says. Zikri would like to see a "science city" built in Egypt, part of an educational environment that could train more scientists like Zuweil. "Zuweil went to a government school and a state university. But when he travelled abroad, he found the right environment to nurture his talents and became the Nobel Prize- winning Zuweil," she says.
