To celebrate British Science Week March 6-15, AWE has worked in partnership with its local schools and the Royal Institution to support delivery of science demonstrations to nearly a 1,000 local students, teachers and parents.
AWE’s Community Engagement Manager, Philippa Kent, who runs the company’s award-winning schools programme, said: “British Science week is a great opportunity to raise the profile of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths) in our local schools.
Hundreds of primary pupils in Basingstoke enjoyed fun science demonstrations by AWE STEM Ambassadors all based on this year’s theme ‘Our Diverse Planet’.
“AWE supports its people to take part in the national STEM Ambassador scheme – helping spread the word about how exciting it is to be a scientist. We give our teams special leave to get involved in going out to schools as part of the national scheme run by STEM Learning, which aims to inspire the next generation of scientists, engineers and technology specialists, “ added Philippa.
AWE also sponsored a series of activities at its local secondary School – The Hurst Community College. Four shows took place last week to launch our British Science week support. Teachers’ students and their families all had the opportunity to see high impact ‘energy live’ demonstrations by The Royal Institution of what energy is and how it affects our lives. There were four shows – two for students, a CPD event for teachers and a community show where families were also able to attend – enabling around 700 people to get involved.
Science Teacher, Ben Hayford, from The Hurst Community College, said: “British Science Week is a fantastic opportunity to get our pupils really thinking about science, engaged in science, excited about science. It’s not just thinking about the science itself but thinking about science careers for the future.
“Thanks to AWE we’ve got the Royal Institution coming in and delivering science shows to year 7 and year 8 during the school day then again in the evening, delivering a science show to hundreds more pupils and their families which is just fantastic.”
Alongside the specific activities we support for British Science Week AWE has an ongoing programme and partnerships which support thousands of young people of all ages to take part in exciting science all year round. Groups of our scientists and engineers work closely with schools and educational Charites to deliver workshops, challenges, events and mentoring across North Hampshire and West Berkshire.
We also work in partnership with Queen Mary’s College in Basingstoke to support their Science Centre, which delivers science sessions every week to local primary school pupils. Since we started sponsoring the centre in September 2019 around 2,000 young people have benefited from free science sessions and free transport on the AWE sponsored minibus. Up to 4,000 young people use the facility each year.