Ambassador case study March 09

March 2009 - Careers Convention

Ambassador - Allan Macrae, Snr Software Engineer
Event - Sutherland Careers Convention, Golspie
Date - 5th of March 2009

Golspie High School was the location of the Sutherland Careers Convention on Thursday 5th March 2009. It was attended by a large number of schoolchildren ranging from 2nd to 5th/6th Year along with, at least one University student, local to the area.

The STEM stand was located amongst the Universities in one corner between the NHS and Strathclyde University stands. A number of schoolchildren freely approached the STEM stand to enquire about the positions or courses on offer while waiting at the Strathclyde University stand. I also engaged pupils as to what they planned to study in future years, what they wanted to do and how they were going to go about it.

A mix of schoolchildren had an idea of what they wanted to study, some determined to do one particular career and nothing else and some had no idea. Just reeling off a list of various different sciences and engineering roles potentially opened the schoolchildren’s eyes to more options. Some were inquisitive wanting to know more about STEM related careers. I believe, that overall, having STEM at events like these is very beneficial as there were 2 key themes:

• schoolchildren have a limited knowledge about the number of different job roles and the multiple degree and subjects that they can choose to help achieve their end goal.
   
• attendees of the Careers fair, whether pupil, teacher or university careers service had very little or no knowledge of STEM.

Therefore attending events like these helps all those involved become more familiar with STEM, our goals and opens up the possibilities for more involvement.