As part of the Year of Engineering government scheme, a KS2 STEM Day was organised at the Science and Industry Museum- funded by BEIS and Bechtel. The schools in attendance were aiming to increase their STEM provision and highlighting to their pupils the multitude of careers available. They arrived with an introductory understanding of what engineering is through a school assembly and it was up to our group of engineers and STEM ambassadors to develop this further.

The theme of the day was to promote creativity, resilience, teamwork and problem-solving skills all of which form the essence of an engineer. On the day, an assortment of Year 5 and 6 pupils marched in and huddled around the presentation area. To begin our session we introduced ourselves, our roles and recent projects we had been working on interspersed with questions to engage the pupils..

The first activity challenged the pupils to build the tallest tower they could with random objects such as foam noodles, giant dice and tophats! We were met with very impressive structures despite the unusual building materials and this reflected how much they had grasped the concept. What followed was a slightly more technical tower building session using paper straws and masking tape. Ideas and excited giggles flew all around the room and as you can see from the pictures the towers vary greatly and demonstrate the variety of ideas in the audience.

This is an essential part of why we want to encourage more people into engineering as everyone brings a different set of skills, a unique perspective and creativity, all of which can contribute to a great design. We all had a fantastic time and hope that the pupils left with an increased awareness of roles within engineering and maybe some inspiration for a career in STEM.