Science, Technology, and Society: Some Philosophical Reflections on a Grade 11 Course

Résumé

In 1984 the Ministry of Education in British Columbia decided to introduce a Science and Technology course at Grade 11. The course focuses upon the relationships among science, technology, and society. Its introduction accompanied a policy decision mandating all Grade 11 students to take some science; about a fifth of Grade 11 students in the province take the course. Previous researchers have reported that the course suffers from a lack of academic status. In this paper I speculate that a contributing factor may be a deeply ingrained cultural one, namely that Aristotelian conceptions of the superiority of pure science over practical knowledge continue to affect the status of school subjects. I also question whether the course presents an accurate portrayal of the nature of technology and of the relationship between technology and science.