To coincide with this year’s British Science Week, schools from the Palladian Academy Trust in Bath and Wiltshire are all taking part in week long STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering & Maths) activities and projects, concluding with two STEM celebration evenings to be held at Ralph Allen School on 17 and 18 March.
The aim of the event is to engage, enthuse and inspire pupils in STEM learning, whilst further raising awareness of BANES Climate Emergency Declaration.
Pupils from each school will be spending part of their week participating in STEM projects around the topic of the environment. In addition to the classroom activities, around 60 children will be attending special STEM workshops organised by Bath based STEAMship. These workshops have been created by the STEAMship team to give children the opportunity to explore and investigate the impact of our everyday actions on our local environment.
The workshops will comprise of around 10 different activities, including working with air pollution monitors in the local area and investigating their journeys to school. STEAMship are an EdTech group of designers, teachers, scientists and coders who specialise in creating STEM projects for schools to enhance the schools STEM curriculum with new and innovative ideas and encourage inventiveness and future skills in the next generation.
The activities will culminate with two special celebration evenings where the children will be exhibiting their works. Dr Christopher R Pudney, Senior Lecturer in Biochemistry, will introduce the events with a talk at the beginning of each evening to enthuse the children about science. The evening events will also be attended by BANES cabinet members Cllr Sarah Warren, Cllr Kevin Guy, Cllr Joanna Wright and Anna Brett from the Council’s Public Health Team, who will be handing out certificates to the pupils.
Councillor Kevin Guy, cabinet member for Children’s Services, said, “Both myself and my cabinet colleagues are really pleased to be invited to this event. We are keen to see how pupils have taken up this challenge, using British Science Week, to raise awareness of the Climate Emergency. We all know we need to invest in our future scientists and engineers, they are the people who will help find solutions to the many climate-related issues that we all need to tackle such as increasing renewable energy, meeting zero-carbon targets and improving the way we get around.”
All 10 Palladian schools involved are: Combe Down Primary, Fitzmaurice Primary, Oldfield Park Infants, Oldfield Park Juniors, St Martin’s Garden Primary, St Philip’s Primary, Widcombe Infants, Widcombe Juniors, Winsley Primary, Ralph Allen Secondary.