The first winner of the Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering, which celebrates an engineer responsible for a ground-breaking innovation of benefit to humanity, will be announced in March 2013.
The prize hopes to inspire and engage young people to take up careers in engineering.
The winner of the £1 million Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering will be selected by an eminent panel of international judges. They will visit the UK in March and have been invited to join the programme of engineering activities, including visiting schools to engage and inspire young people in engineering.
Engineering UK, the British Science Association, Speakers for Schools and its sister programme Inspiring the Future teamed up to develop a programme of activities in March, to coincide with other STEM events, such as The Big Bang fair, the Grand Challenges Summit and National Science and Engineering Week.
As part of that programme, and to mark the award of the first QEPrize, engineers across the county are being invited to visit state schools in order to share their passion for engineering with young people.
Over half of all secondary schools in England have applied for a speaker through the Speakers for Schools programme and many are keen to hear prominent engineers and scientists talk to their students.
A similar number of schools have signed up for the sister programme Inspiring the Future, which aims to recruit 100,000 people at all stages of their careers – from apprentices to CEOs – to go into local schools to talk about their work and career route.
The leaders of engineering firms employing large numbers of engineers will be asked to encourage their employees to take part in Inspiring the Future.
