Introducing CASE
The Center for the Advancement of Science Education ( CASE ) was established as an university functional center by NTU in October 2008. Professor Jwu-Ting Chen of Department of Chemistry is appointed to lead the CASE as the first director, who believes that a society may be invigorated by rational thinking through proper science education. He also appeals to that the science education in universities can not only cultivate the talents with frontier knowledge but also make changes to the public.
Since launching her mission in 2009 spring, till now the CASE has committed to science education and science communication in parallel. The services include “Exploration Lectures” which are of the most popular and successful speech activity, and setting an internet blog – “CASE Press” for the literature approach. In addition, OCW for science in NTU, Chien-Kuo science class, NSC High-Scope Program, MOE project for STS course- development, etc. are also encompassed as regular jobs.?
About Exploration Lectures
In 1825, Michael Faraday, FRS of British Royal Institution started “Christmas Lectures”, and frontier science could have been delivered to the general audience in an entertaining style.? The RI Christmas lectures successfully upgraded the accomplishment of the students in science and caught tremendous attention from the public in Europe. Many world-renown scholars have contributed their knowledge in these lectures. The Christmas Lectureship is still running until now, except the brief interruptions during the Second World War.
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With intention to follow the venture as the Royal Institution Christmas Lectures do, CASE has started weekend “Exploration lectures” of popular science of which, however, the contents are closely attached to fundamental science. In each school semester, 10 lectures in a series in terms of a common theme are organized. Science history is often incorporated with the science axioms, so that even people who have no prior knowledge about science can catch what they are listening to and find some joy in it.?
The first series of Exploration lectures in spring, “Darwin’s Revolutionary Road” involving evolution, anthropology, and microbiology was such a great hit that the lecture hall were filled up with audiences varying from young to elderly people and from high school students to housewives. This wide variation of audiences with different ages and classes indicates that everyone may appeal to science if only the enthusiasm may be aroused.
A Classical Scientific Pieces through the Ancient and Modern Ages:
2009 Constellation Concerto
The second series of Exploration lectures in fall 2009 is composed with astronomy, physics, and mathematics. It is expected to lead audiences into a historical tunnel and to set off from the origin of Greek astronomy and mathematics, bounding for the great scientific revolution led by rebellious scientists such as Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo, and Newton. The audiences are anticipated to go through the disputes between traditional and new perspectives, and therefore they may appreciate the construction of modern perspectives from different scientists.
A Window and Platform for Popular Science Education
CASE also works on an internet-based platform for popular science education. For better accessibility to ordinary people, CASE has developed an internet window, cooperating with National Center for High-Performance Computing, to deliver the videos of every lecture through both lively streaming and media on demand.? Besides, CASE also aims to build up windows to collect as many varieties of lectures for fundamental science with good teaching quality and contains as possible. We anticipate to turn them into on-line learning resources, and present them in a well-designed user interface.? In this way, CASE resolves on taking the leading role of open courseware for fundamental science in Chinese language in the foreseeable future.
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Phone: +886-2-3366-2801 ?Fax: +886-2-3366-2805