Four teachers were recently recognised by the ERA Foundation for their continuous work in and around STEM. The Manufacturer’s Molly Cooper spoke to them about their impact in the classroom and what the industry needs to do to help.
In June, the ERA Foundation held its annual dinner at The Royal Society, London. Each year it recognises exceptional secondary and primary school teachers who have gone beyond the curriculum to inspire students and show real-world engineering in the classroom. They are recognised by the David Clark Prize, named after former ERA Foundation Secretary Dr David Clark, who presented the awards.
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Paul Tyler is the STEM and innovation lead at Kirkhill Primary School, East Renfrewshire, Scotland. He won the David Clark prize for reimagining aspects of the school’s curriculum to focus more on STEM and sustainability.
Paul’s interest is in exploring why children are not pursing STEM careers, despite enjoying the subjects, and it has driven his involvement within the sector. Paul co-founded My Science Club, a company that produces science club resources for teachers and schools.
Introducing STEM careers to young children is crucial between the ages of 8 and 12 and Paul believes primary schools need to seek partnerships with organisations and companies to allow children access to a wide variety of role models.
What were the processes and challenges faced while reimagining Kirkhill Primary School’s STEM curriculum?
PT: I explained to the headteacher how I wanted to add something which gave pupils the chance to be creative in STEM.
One of the main challenges with a materials-based curriculum is cost. The student/parent council were extremely supportive and at the start of the year, I received £3,000 to buy consumables and equipment. I also went online to find second-hand boxes of building materials, contacted local hardware stores and collected lots of cardboard.
Another challenge has been the safety of the work. When I’m teaching a group of children how to safely use a saw or craft knife, I need to be able to focus on that group. To ensure this, I set them challenges when they come into the classroom, based around STEM skills. Once I encouraged them to take part, I found that they now enter the classroom and begin themselves.
How have collaborations and partnerships with organisations enhanced the STEM curriculum?
To build relationships I reached out to the local community, school community and parents. I got involved in an organisation called SmartSTEMs, which run events to put schools in contact with industries. I also found that many parents hold roles within STEM and were willing to give up some time to speak with the pupils. I emailed many local businesses stating who we were, what we wanted to achieve and if they could help. We ended up with over 100 partners in STEM and are now working together to develop young workforce programmes.
However, partnerships are a two-way street; it’s not only a matter of what they can offer us, but what we can offer them. An example of this is the Royal Observatory in Edinburgh which use our school to test all their new resources. They will deliver a brand-new project; we test it for three weeks and then give feedback.
My advice would be to be proactive. It’s a fabulous way of enhancing the curriculum and providing children with real life context that is often quite difficult to do as teachers; especially in areas where we’re not experts.
What are your goals for your STEM Innovation Hub? How do you see this influencing the students’ learning and interest in STEM fields?
We have a STEM Innovation Hub for the older children and a STEM Creativity Hub for younger pupils. They are focused around creating a progressive curriculum for children as soon as they begin primary school.
Next year, part of my curriculum is going to be called Sustainable Engineering and will look at sustainability, the problems that we’re currently facing, what the solutions could be, and how engineering can be right at the centre of those solutions. We’re also getting involved with the Global School’s Partnership and this will help establish international partnerships and let us share ideas and projects.
Anthony Vaughan-Evans is Director of STEM at East Point Academy, Lowestoft. He won the David Clark Prize in the secondary school category for his commitment to delivering STEM to young people.
On becoming a teacher after completing an electrical engineering degree from Warwick University, he realised that STEM in schools was only focusing on design and technology. He saw a gap and a need to upskill pupils for STEM roles in the future, and found that most academic pupils working in maths and science didn’t have enough awareness of future roles available to them.
He knew he had to broaden pupils’ horizons as early as possible. And, by getting them locked into a career path early on, they began to focus and follow it throughout school.
Can you explain your ‘STEM in Action’ initiative?
AVE: I’ve run the ‘STEM in Action’ project for a few years and it is a collaboration between industry or an employer and the school.
I develop a curriculum appropriate problem that the pupils will be working on in their GCSE science or maths, but it will also be appropriate to industry.
An example of this is when we went to Sizewell nuclear power plant and the pupils got to look around the site. They then worked on some maths problems to look at how fast the turbines were moving. This gave them the opportunity to go out and actually see these huge turbines in action, and work out a real problem. This has far more impact than showing them anything in a classroom.
Not only that, but I have had engineers come into the school to work alongside. the pupils on the problem. This provides the link between young people and the real world of engineering, and is more powerful than a lecture as it showcases the day-to-day life of jobs in STEM.
After they have found the solution, we hold a celebration event where we all come together, and the pupils present their findings. This also helps with teaching young people how to give a technical presentation and talk to an audience.
You are in the process of creating a ‘Centre of Excellence for STEM’ at East Point Academy. How do you see this centre transforming STEM education?
I have been working on developing a network of other STEM teachers across the local area and we currently have 50 from different schools that meet each term.
One of the biggest problems we face is that teachers do not have time to execute these types of activities regarding STEM. With the ‘Centre of Excellence for STEM’, I’m aiming to make my projects available for all schools. I provide them with contacts for other opportunities, resources, equipment and overall, an opportunity to increase STEM participation at their school.
Your work focuses on delivering STEM education in deprived areas. Can you share some examples of how your initiatives have impacted students in these communities?
The key to this is parental engagement. I run several workshops for parents, to engage them in STEM careers first. In my class last year, I didn’t have a single pupil that wanted to be an engineer, but I had two that wanted to be a plumber and a carpenter. There are no issues with this, but it is clear to see that they are aiming at those careers due to the role models that they are seeing around them.
To aid this, I often bid for grants to take pupils on trips which help them see the bigger picture. It’s about raising the bar for our young people and making them see what’s possible.
Can you explain the plan to develop projects that engage parents and highlight STEM opportunities, particularly focusing on female role models?
In these workshops, we look at the skills the pupils have and match them to jobs, and quite often this is linked to what they enjoy doing. I encourage conversations with mothers and daughters about these roles and it has had a huge impact.
I have also had women engineers come in to the school to speak to the young people, so they understand that they have the ability to work in a role within STEM. The parents are then able to see how great their child is at something, and that also begins the encouragement for that path at home.
Becki Price is a part-time year five primary school teacher in Stoke on Trent. On the days she is not teaching she works with The Primary Science Teaching Trust as a fellow providing opportunities for the Primary Science Quality Mark and for the Centre for Industry Education Collaboration (CIEC). She was highly commended for the David Clarke prize for her commitment to building positive perceptions of STEM futures for every child.
When becoming a teacher herself and given the role of Science Lead at her school, it sparked her interest in STEM. Becki began meeting people within that sector, learning what STEM was and the impact it can have on children.
For Becki, children need to learn and appreciate themselves as scientists by understanding how they can achieve their full potential. She also added that a national strategy for skills development, and an individual in every school responsible for brokering those relationships between the schools and industries, is key.
What has been implemented at The Willows Primary School to grow positive perceptions of STEM?
BP: Firstly, we have pushed on the skills that we can pull out from the curriculum and focused on what can make the pupil a better scientist in each lesson. Children need to be asking questions and this self-assessment of their skills and encouragement will have a longlasting impact.
We also have a Curiosity Club where the children take part in activities, and then meet the scientists who represent that activity at the end. This is great because they get to meet, chat and quiz a scientist and foster a relationship. How do you ensure that your STEM initiatives are inclusive and accessible to children from diverse backgrounds?
One resource many teachers use is a website called Explorify which provides prompts for questions. One of these is ‘Have you ever?’ and at the beginning of the lesson I place this on the board and ask questions regarding our topic. For example, if we are learning about medicine, I would ask, ‘Have you ever had Calpol?’ or ‘Have you ever had a cold?’ and immediately the children can relate. It is immediately brokering that relationship between what the industry does and what they could learn, but it is also presenting the children with something they are familiar with.
What strategies have you used to extend your passion for STEM beyond The Willows Primary School?
We’ve worked alongside the Royal Society, for partnership and seed grants. Part of this included working with around 18 schools in Stoke on Trent. We got involved with scientists and local industries who were willing to meet with schools and turn their proposal questions into partnership grants. By utilising the Royal Society grants, we have been successful in building those industry and school relationships.
Another project we ran was called Adopt a Scientist, where we moved away from the ‘one-stop-shop’ approach that most schools and industries have when looking at careers. We wanted to create a longerlasting relationship for the class. The children meet the scientist, discuss the importance of STEM and give them ‘adoption certificates’. This sees the scientists make a pledge to keep in contact and the school will then share industry relevant activities they have done with them.
What challenges have you faced in promoting STEM education, and how have you overcome them?
School work around careers continues to come up in research and Ofsted reports, but doesn’t fit neatly into the curriculum, so teachers don’t plan for it; and it has been a long time since this has been revised. Unfortunately, links with industries can be sporadic and hard to plan for, so the type of engagement we get can vary from year to year. These are challenges that are yet to be solved, but with collaboration we can.
Kate Finlay is Head of Design and Technology at Hethersett Academy, a school run by the Inspiration Trust, who she also works for as subject lead for design and technology, alongside primary and secondary school teachers. Kate was highly commended for the David Clarke prize for her tireless work to design a curriculum that enables engagement for all children.
Over her long teaching career, she has seen the rapid pace at which industry and technologies within it grow – including the development of 3D printers, biodegradable materials and CAD software – and how exciting it can be.
For Kate, the reason introducing STEM careers to children is important is due to social mobility. There are huge opportunities such as earning a good salary, travelling around the world and being highly skilled. Companies are always looking for new workers to train and young people are the ideal candidates.
What programmes have you implemented to ensure inclusivity in STEM education?
KF: It is important when engaging with industry that we have a good balance of pupils and for me I want to include a large percentage of pupil premium students. This funding is given to schools to improve educational outcomes for disadvantaged pupils. The reason behind this is not to ensure they go to university, but to give them the confidence and selfworth around the opportunities that are available. With pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds, those conversations aren’t always happening at home.
At the Skills for Energy Conference with the East of England Energy Group, students participated in a competition to solve a water reuse challenge for new hydrogen plants. On launch day, experts, apprentices and UEA students helped them brainstorm ideas. On the show floor, visitors and exhibitors then listened to pitches and voted for the best ideas.
At first, the children were shy and reserved, so I divided them into groups to present their work to attendees. However, by the end of the day, they confidently shared their projects with experts from major energy companies. This experience was invaluable, helping them gain confidence and receive feedback from those who work in the industry.
What challenges have you faced?
I always assume that everyone can talk to children, but it can be difficult. When having guests in, I often make them work in smaller groups or with a teacher representative to help broker that relationship.
A challenge for the industry is when trying to engage with students; maybe talk to your neighbours – other companies that are offering apprenticeships or working with schools. You may find some things that you could be doing yourselves.
You have significantly increased student enrolment in the Design & Technology GCSE at your school. What helped make it appealing to students?
One of the issues with design and technology is that you often work in isolation, so we had to ensure the work in the classroom was being shared. We sent a newsletter home and created our own X profile, @MadeInHethersett, where we tagged teachers and companies so they could interact.
One of the biggest barriers is that although children love the subject, they don’t tend to opt for it at GCSE level. I kept hearing from the children, ‘I love your lessons, but I’ll never be a designer, so I’ve chosen something else’. The faculty and I covered the whole department in hearts plus the slogan and hashtag, ‘Choose what you love’, to get the message through to the children. It opened up conversations about what choosing design and technology could do for them and it worked.
How do experiences outside of school, like visiting local workplaces, enhance students’ learning and career aspirations?
For me, the best feedback is seeing the uptake in my subject area courses from my students. Seeing someone you taught now working within the sector, and the impact that quality conversations around careers can have on them is great.
From a curriculum level, it is when they start to build things together and see the bigger picture. We currently teach industry level CAD and provide these skills for their CV. They are told how much a CAD designer earns, and it gives them some insight into a role they could do.
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