STEVEN LANG
Still in her first month as Provincial Coordinator for Eskom Expo for Young Scientists, Sihle Shange has already visited several cities, towns and villages in the Eastern Cape.
She is based in Gqeberha, but fully intends to encourage young people to study science throughout this huge province.
Sihle describes herself as a hydrologist by training who worked in the field for ten years. So how did a hydrologist from northern KwaZulu-Natal become a science communicator supporting science education in the Eastern Cape?
She says that it was primarily ‘worrying’ that led her to this career path.
She was aware that villagers in Northern KwaZulu Natal were struggling. They planted bananas and amadumbe for their livelihood, but the yield of these traditional crops was falling because the wetland areas were not so wet anymore.
Sihle believed that a more scientific approach to farming would benefit the local communities. The problem was that local learners were not proficient in English and struggled to come to grips with science. Almost all the relevant literature is produced in English.
There was a clear need for someone who could bridge the gap between experts on the one hand, and village communities on the other.
As part of her work as a Science Communicator in the wetland areas of Northern KwaZulu Natal, Sihle took it upon herself to teach local residents how to make better use of available resources.
She approached scientists researching soils and other aspects of the wetlands and put it to them, “There’s so much you’re doing that is in the books that we never read about. Could you come to my community and tell them what’s happening? Most of our wetlands are drying up. We’re not getting the yield of amadumbe as we used to”. They needed a holistic, more science based method to safeguard their future crops. It was a matter of survival.
That was how her journey as a science communicator began. She explained that someone had to do something on the ground, “. . . so that’s when I went into the villages and started a science centre to make everybody aware of the science and start communicating”.
Furthering her career as a science communicator, Sihle completed a science communication course at Stellenbosch University and took up employment at the Inkcubeko Youth and Science Centre in Thembalethu, a township in George.
After two years at the science centre, Sihle felt ready for the challenges of Eskom Expo for Young Scientists.
Still organising her priorities for her new post, Sihle looks forward to consolidating the strengths of Eskom Expo. This means that she will work with schools that have a record of participating in Eskom Expo to secure their continued involvement and maintaining, or improving, the quality of the entries in the regional competitions.
While focussing on the existing participants, she will also plan for an expansion of the project. For example, she recently visited Bizana in the Winnie Madikizela Mandela local municipality with an eye to opening a new district. She chose Bizana, “because they don’t have Expo there and it was so nice to see the energy that teachers have”.
Sihle stressed the importance of enthusiastic teachers. “We don’t have a direct connection with the learners, so we are relying on the teachers to have the zeal in loving Eskom Expo. And it is only when that teacher loves Science Expo that we can get their learners”.
She said it is important for teachers to “infuse the love of science in their learners and it’s only then that we have access to the child”.
The Eskom Expo for Young Scientists is a science fair where students have a chance to show others their projects about their own scientific investigations. At the annual prestigious Eskom Expo for Young Scientists International Science Fair (ISF), selected students from 35 Expo Regions in South Africa then compete against the best young scientists from around the country and around the world.
- This article was first published in Talk of the Town, April 3, 2025. The newspaper serving the communities of Ndlambe and the Sunshine Coast, with a weekly wrap of Makhanda news, is available at stores from early on Thursdays.
