A STEM Ambassador's involvement can engage and enthuse both students and teachers. If you are interested in asking a STEM Ambassador to assist you can make your request here. We’ve created brief guides to encourage both STEM Ambassadors and educators to use the self-service. 

STEM Ambassador Professor Anthony Campbell founder of a Pembrokeshire charity- The Darwin Centre, which has brought the magic of science to thousands of young people, has been awarded a CBE in the New Year Honours list 2021.

Professor Anthony Campbell, founded the Darwin Centre for Biology and Medicine, has received  his award for services to biochemistry.
The Darwin Centre was set up in 1993 and is based in  Pembrokeshire. It has since raised over £1 million of funding and influenced about 40,000 children by offering hands-on field trips and workshops to every school in Pembrokeshire on themes such as forces, and renewable energy, rocky shores and  climate change.

"The Darwin Centre are absolutely thrilled for Tony, as he has always been such an inspiration to everyone who has been fortunate enough to work with him."
Professor Campbell, is a Honarary Research Professor in the School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences at Cardiff University. He is an international authority in cell signalling - which lies at the heart of how hormones, neurotransmitters and drugs affect the human body - and is also a world authority on bioluminescence.
One of his inventions, using chemiluminescence, is now used in several hundred million clinical tests per year worldwide and has been hailed as one of the top 100 inventions from UK universities in the past 50 years.
For the past 15 years his research focus has been lactose and food intolerance, which has led to a new hypothesis on the cause of irritable bowel syndrome
His natural curiosity and  need for helping people understand science has also led him to create the scientific journal with his wife, called The Young Darwinian, where students can publish their projects,
 “I feel very strongly that scientists have a responsibly to explain why they do what they do to the general public, particularly if you’re in the public sector,” said Anthony. 
“It is also a lot of fun. When you’re passionate about something you never give it up…”
 

Lemmiout Activities  Offer STEM activities to schools, specifically designed to be undertaken outdoors.
They are hands on active sessions that are designed around the new welsh curriculum.
We have a number of things you may be interested in from our full term Boxcar project or a cut down version. To single day workshops. custom built workshops to fit your school requirements and staff training workshops.
Our current themes are Go-kart designing. Rocket propulsion. Energy transfer (yr 6 or staff training)   but we have many more options available just get in touch and we can explain more.
We have experience delivering outdoor activities and STEM based projects to students from year 3 upwards and are keen and enthusiastic to encourage and enthuse students with active STEM education.
Below are some pictures of our box car project. More information can be found on our website www.lemmiout.co.uk
Or feel free to contact us on info@lemmiout.co.uk or 07834162647 for more details

Project managing the first Bitesize Science Festival in her home town of Merthyr Tydfil, Summer of 2019 – Claire created the first science festival of its kind in the town, and one of the first few to be held outside a university city. Several Ambassadors supported the inaugural Festival.
Photo ©wales247.co.uk 

As always, Thursday, Friday and Saturday provide a wealth of sessions for our primary, secondary and further education communities, including sessions from Dr Jasper Green HMI Subject Lead for Science, Ofsted and a fantastic selection of Frontier Science sessions, with leading experts across scientific research such as Professor Jim Al-Khalili, Professor Robin Lovell-Badge of the Crick Institute, Professor Andrew Pollard of the Oxford Vaccine Group and more. 
Tickets (from £35+VAT for ASE members and £60+VAT for non-members) are now bookable. Zoom Links to virtual rooms will be circulated on the evening prior to each day, to the emails of those registered on Eventbrite. For queries please email conferences@ase.org.uk. The live online timetable Sched is available for viewing at https://ase2021annualconferenceonline.sched.com/
 

Start planning now for British Science Week 2021!

The British Science Association (BSA) have issued their popular 'sneak peek' packs for British Science Week 2021 - from the 5^thto the 14^thof March - with the full versions due in January. There are 3 separate packs with one each for Early Years, Primary and Secondary. The theme for the British Science Week 2021 activity packs and poster competition is ‘Innovating for the future’ and they are full of tips to help you organise events and activities for British Science Week.

The packs also give suggestions on how to engage remotely with STEM Ambassadors and other volunteers who can really bring your Science Week to life. 

Many of the activities are CREST accredited, so why not think about running a CREST Award during British Science Week? CREST Awards give students real-life experience of being a scientist while getting introduced to STEM project work. They are nationally accredited and are a fun, yet educational way to get your children involved in STEM subjects. And Discovery, Bronze, Silver and Gold Awards are all free in Wales!

Don't forget the Poster Competition The theme for the 2021 poster competition is Innovating for the future. Entrants can be teams or individuals. Each school/youth group can enter a maximum of five entries. We encourage you to run the competition with larger groups, but to select the top five to enter from your school. Entries must be one page of A4 or A3 paper only and you will need to take a photo or scan of it to send electronically. You can also get inspired by looking at last year’s competition winners here.

Cardiff Science Festival online - Feb 18-21

Cardiff Science Festival takes over Wales’ capital to inspire and educate between February 18th-21st. The Festival will showcase science, technology, engineering and maths, integrating them into the capital city of Wales. The four-day festival usually spreads throughout Cardiff’s libraries, cafes, bars and streets, with hidden events for your to discover - this year the online provision will be even better!

Our aim is to celebrate science, technology, engineering and maths, and how they affect our every day lives. We bring science to you, with a range of events that are guaranteed to captivate and teach you something new.

Cardiff is a hub for science research and world-renowned science communicators. By following our map around the city, you can learn something new from the best researchers and communicators, right on your doorstep.

When: Monday 25 January 2021, between 3pm and 6pm (1 hour, time TBC – do let us know your preference).What it involves: Provide feedback on the RSC’s new support for the curriculum change. You would receive the draft documents this month. The documents elaborate on the descriptions of learning and show what good progression in chemistry could look like in the new curriculum.Register your interest with Helen Dearns

More information

The Royal Society Chemistry is committed to supporting teachers of chemistry in Wales during the planning and development of their new school curriculum. The new curriculum presents an exciting opportunity to improve the outcomes of students in Wales but equally poses many questions and challenges for teachers. 

To assist you through this transition, the RSC has a dedicated Teacher Fellow, Helen Dearns, working on a support package. Helen is currently finalising a document that elaborates on the descriptions of learning that are relevant to chemistry for progression step 4, showing what good progression could look like. In addition to this, she aims to produce resources to assist you to make cross-curricular links and to help deepen students’ knowledge in line with the ‘four purposes’. 

FREE Facilitated CREST Discovery Workshops -
Machines of the Future  for yrs 7 to 9

From mid February through to the end of the summer term, See Science will be offering a variety of FREE workshops to schools across Wales. We will be flexible in how we deliver these workshops, depending on COVID restrictions - delivering face to face in schools or virtually via live links on platforms to suit the schools. The newest suite of CREST project activities is centred around Machines of the Future and the Discovery Award activity is based on Machine Learning.
In the 5 hour project, pupils work in teams to find out about machine learning and come up with an idea for using it in a home environment. The project can be run as a whole day activity or over 5 separate 1 hour sessions to suit the teacher and school. More information available by contacting Llinos  here. 

We will be flexible in how we deliver these workshops, depending on COVID restrictions - delivering face to face in schools or virtually via live links on platforms to suit the schools. This engaging programme from Engineering UK, funded by Shell, aims to increase the number of young people from underrepresented audiences choosing Engineering as a career. For more information or to register your interest, contact Llinos here

First Lego League Challenge

An online competition for teams of young people, to encourage an interest in real-world themes and develop key skills that are crucial for their future careers.


 Registration is now open for 2020-2021 FIRST® LEGO® League Challenge season. Get your team together and think about the ways we can get people moving. FIRST® LEGO® League Challenge is a global STEM programme for teams of young people, to encourage an interest in real world themes and develop key skills that are crucial for their future careers. Young people work together to explore a given topic and to design, build and program an autonomous LEGO® robot to solve a series of missions. For more information click here. In Wales we are offering three online tournaments – March 19(Welsh Medium) , April 16 – West Wales. April 23- SE Wales. Click here to register and here to contact for more information

This opportunity is suitable for students in years 10 to 13 or the equivalent and preference will be given to students applying from schools local to our Gloucestershire New Mills site and our Miskin site in South Wales. We may be able to run a face to face follow up half-day event for students that successfully complete the work experience with us when COVID restrictions lift.

How could Lost Learning in Chemistry help your school?

2020 has been a difficult year for everyone, and in particular for students who have missed hours of face-to-face teaching during lockdown and beyond. Lost Learning in Chemistry from the Royal Society of Chemistry aims to support schools and colleges to mitigate the effects of COVID-19 measures on students’ learning in chemistry.Through the project the RSC will support up to ten schools with funding of up to £2000 along with additional support in implementing projects during 2021.The impact of lost learning is even greater in communities where schools and families are less likely to be well resourced in terms of access to technology and other learning support, which is why Lost Learning in Chemistry is targeted at secondary schools and colleges that have at least 25% students receiving free school meals. 

The Royal Society of Chemistry are inviting you to put forward your ideas for how your students can best be supported to: Catch up with work they have missed or keep on top of their studies during the continued disruption caused by the pandemic. You can find out more about Lost Learning in Chemistry and see examples of project ideas on the education website.

How to apply

The application process is simple and straightforward, and we will support you throughout to make the best of your ideas. Any member of a science department can submit an application, but please make sure you have the consent of your head of department and include their contact details so that we can copy them into any correspondence. 

To begin with, you will be asked to complete a short expression of interest form, outlining your idea and what support you need to implement it.

If your school fulfils the eligibility criteria, the team will schedule a call to discuss your idea. The questions will be shared in advance, so you have a chance to prepare. After the call the team will form a proposal based on your discussion which will be shared with you for approval before finalising it.

If you would like Lost Learning in Chemistry to support your school or have any questions, please get in touch to discuss your application.