How to Reactivate Primary and Secondary Science Education in Japan Is it then possible to reactivate primary and secondary science education in Japan?
In view of the analyses described above, effective solutions may be necessarily rather drastic. One measure is the abolishment of COS. The author of this paper admits the positive role of COS in the past. The reason why COS lost its initial mission is that COS adheres to a policy of reducing the maximum amount of content in COS. If the role of COS is to delineate minimum requirements for students, then its role will be more positive. The second measure is the abolishment of STSS. The author believes, based on his experiences as the editor-in-chief of textbooks which suffered under STSS, that STSS carries more responsibility than COS for the deterioration of primary and secondary science education in Japan. COS in effect provides a set of guidelines (of maximum content) which the authors of textbooks must follow. In order to encourage better students/pupils, authors might try to conceal some hints by which teachers could introduce some topics beyond those set down by COS. Such attempts
