You may have heard about the trick of fooling a breathalyser test by first rinsing your mouth with mouthwash. Now, ignoring whether the police would let you do it in the first place, would it work?

Sure, mouthwash might mask beer breath, but the machine doesn't care about halitosis, it's sniffing for alcohol vapour - and mouthwash has twice the alcohol content of wine.

So, would the trick work? Of course not, as viewers of the TV show Mythbusters will tell you.

Point is, a little bit of scientific thinking blows the trick wide open. You didn't have to know a heap of facts, but you did have to consider that a breathalyser is probably going to be detecting something on your breath and that you should perhaps check what's in mouthwash before trying it out on the local constabulary.

This logical approach is what science teaches you - plus you get to learn really interesting stuff about how the world works.

Suzy Balogh, the Olympic gold medal-winning shooter whose day job is with the NSW Department of Primary Industries, put it this way: "One of the best things about doing science is that when I watch things like CSI, I get it".

Scientists can end up travelling the world, exploring things no-one's seen before, inventing stuff and maybe even making a positive difference to people's lives.

But, even if you don't want to do those neat things, the problem-solving skills you'll pick up by doing science are just what employers are looking for. Jason Farrugia did a double degree in chemistry and commerce and applied for jobs in both when he graduated. He said: "When I was being interviewed for the finance ones, they were quite interested in my science skills because of how scientists break down problems." He ended up in science.

Doing science subjects in Year 11 and 12 widens your options. They won't count against you if you enrol in a uni or TAFE course that doesn't have anything to do with science because the most common prerequisites across all courses are English and maths.

Yep, maths. "When I was in Year 10 I thought there's no chance I'd ever be using this stuff again - I was so wrong!" said Phil Valencia, who's with CSIRO and gets to work on projects for NASA. Scott Burgess, a surfie from Perth, now at the Australian Institute of Marine Science in Townsville, said: "I hated maths when I was at school, I thought it was useless. Now that I've worked around a bit, I can see all the applications where I could use maths."

However, even if you didn't do the subjects at school that you find you need later, you can make them up. Professor Trevor Hambley, who heads up chemistry at The University of Sydney, said: "A fifth of the students enrolling in chemistry in this department have never done chemistry in high school - not that I'm suggesting people do it that way!"

Studying science gives you an awesome array of problem-solving skills. You won't get fooled again and employers will love you for it.

As Peter Doherty said: "It doesn't matter who you are or where you come from, you can excel in science". He started out as a vet in rural Queensland and went on to win a Nobel Prize for his scientific research.

To find out more about careers in science, and the benefits of studying science in Years 11 and 12, check out www.careersinscience.gov.au