journal of science
education
Editorial
This issue marks the beginning of the tenth year of publication of Resonance. Many of us who went to school in the 1960s and 1970s have fond memories of Science Today, a popular science magazine published by the Times of India group. Times have changed since then. Children have less leisure time, and also have ready and quick, but not always accurate, information. When in need of an answer, our first instinct is to do search on Google or to go to an encyclopedia. The process of self discovery through thought or experiment has been undermined. Perhaps it is more difficult to draw and hold attention today than in the Science Today days. But, still it is a small incident that triggers a person’s interest in a certain field of science or into science itself: a hobby kit an aunt has presented, an inspirational lecture, a book or an article. One of the roles we hope that Resonance is playing, is to act as such a trigger. We recognise that continual corrective measures are necessary to improve and increase the impact of Resonance. The tenth year seems an appropriate time. Towards this end we welcome feedback and suggestions from our young readers, their teachers and parents.
It is important that a society identifies and nurtures extraordinary talent. Equally important, perhaps, is that few restrictions are placed on the advancement of a career at any stage. One such example of flexibility in the US educational system is reflected in the life of the scientist featured in this issue. Florence Jessie Mac Williams took a long break from studies, obtained her PhD at the age of 44, and went on to make significant contributions in coding theory, which are particularly useful in the present information age. And how information can be sent efficiently and reliably is the subject of the article Expander Codes by Priti Shankar. An important combinatorial result of MacWilliams called the ‘MacWilliams Identity’ is described in an extract from Madhu Sudan’s lectures on Algorithmic Coding Theory.
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