Science isn’t just whitefella business »

Embracing Science Technology Engineering and Maths (STEM) strengthens whole communities and nations. It's a powerful thing, when a culture reaches out to the knowledge of the whole world. Modern science can enrich indigenous culture, and vice versa, but failing to embrace it will perpetuate the current education and health gap between white Australians and their Indigenous counterparts, an ANU academic has said. Indigenous mathematician Associate Professor Rowena Ball has challenged both the Indigenous and scientific communities in a new paper published in Australian Quarterly entitled Stem the Gap: Science belongs to us mob too. "Embracing Science Technology Engineering and Maths (STEM) strengthens whole communities and nations. It's a powerful thing, when a culture reaches out to the knowledge of the whole world," Associate Professor Ball said. "Yet in Australia Indigenous people are under-represented in STEM, to an extent that could amount to a violation of human rights under Article 27 of the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which specifically recognises the right of everyone to science.