Women in STEM inspire children at Highfield and Brookham Schools

To celebrate British Science Week, Highfield and Brookham Schools had some very important visitors: Jane Boswell, Clinical Director at Liphook Equine Hospital, Dr Lizet Horn, Principal Dentist at Worthing Road Dental Practice, Cathryn King, Forensics Scientist at Metropolitan Police and Fiona Sperry, CEO at Three Fields Entertainment. These four inspirational women ran STEM workshops for children to develop their understanding of Science in the world around them.

With the knowledge that one in ten STEM roles are unfilled in an increasingly technological world, the children were astonished and enthused to learn that these jobs actually existed – especially designing video games! They were shown how to use a stethoscope to listen to their own heartbeats, and then to the heartbeat of a real-life miniature Shetland pony. They listened in awe as they learnt plenty of new facts including the fact that teeth are the only part of our body that is unable to heal itself. They were also able to see how footprints could be detected, printed their own fingerprints and were even given mouth swabs to show how DNA could be collected. Finally, they learnt how to successfully direct an avatar by testing and modifying coding instructions.

Sophie Baber, Headteacher at Brookham School said, “British Science Week has given us the most fantastic platform to educate our children about jobs of the future and to demonstrate what they are learning at school means in the real world. Most children concluded they would work hard in Maths and Science so that they could have the opportunity to choose one of these careers. On the back of the success, we are going to start a coding club next term - the future seems to be in good hands!”

If you would like to find out more about Highfield and Brookham Schools visit highfieldandbrookham.co.uk.