China put scientists on billboards. Why can’t we?

What if the face staring back at you from a giant billboard was not a celebrity, but a scientist whose work had changed millions of lives? That is exactly what has been happening in China!

Several cities have replaced commercial advertisements on large public screens with portraits of people like rocket scientist Qian Xuesen, Nobel laureate Tu Youyou and agricultural scientist Yuan Longping. Their names and achievements are displayed in some of the most visible places in the city.

Tap here to add The Daily Star as a trusted source

It is a simple idea, but it raises a question Bangladesh should probably ask itself: who do we want our young people to look up to?

Fame in Bangladesh is closely tied to popularity. The people we see most often are the people who appear on television, social media, billboards and advertisements. Their faces become familiar simply because we keep seeing them.

Meanwhile, plenty of people doing remarkable work remain almost completely unknown outside their own fields.

A teenager can probably name several celebrities without thinking twice. Ask them to name a Bangladeshi scientist whose work they admire, and the answer may take considerably longer.

That is not because scientists are less interesting. It is because we rarely make them part of everyday culture.

We put celebrities on billboards because they attract attention. However, attention can also shape aspiration. The people we repeatedly see being celebrated become the people we start associating with success.

Imagine if that visibility extended beyond entertainment. Imagine walking through Dhaka and seeing the face of a Bangladeshi researcher alongside a short explanation of what they discovered. Imagine schools making scientists household names rather than people students only encounter in textbooks.

The point is not to take anything away from actors, musicians, or athletes. They have their place, and people will always have their favourite stars, but a society should have more than one definition of a role model.

China's billboard campaign has already turned scientists into something closer to public celebrities, with people even stopping to take photographs of the displays.

If we want the next generation to dream about discovering something, building something or solving a problem, perhaps they need to see those people celebrated too.

Maybe it is time we changed who gets the spotlight.