The half-day ‘Secondary School Challenge’ involves building a mini version of the Terminal 5 Track Transit System (TTS) – the driverless electric train that shuttles passengers to their boarding gates.
Heathrow’s aim is to give year 8 pupils insights into the wide variety of engineering careers and the skills and knowledge required for them, helping to boost the UK’s engineering prospects.
Jeremy King, Chartered Civil Engineer and school activity provider, first teaches students about basic electrical circuits before setting a series of challenges, including using pressure switches, slide switches and electronic controllers to programme mini ‘trains’ to perform actions similar to the TTS. Students are helped with each challenge by Heathrow volunteers and engineering apprentices.
Harsha Val, Heathrow’s Engineering Training and Competency Leader, says: ‘The aim of the challenge is to introduce pupils to engineering in a fun, interactive, relevant way which we hope will ignite an interest for studying STEM1 subjects in the future. Each session gives us an opportunity to explain the benefits of careers in engineering and also makes it clear to pupils the requirements and hard work needed to get into Heathrow’s engineering apprenticeship scheme.’
The Challenge is funded by Heathrow as part of its work to inspire those in local communities to consider the broad range of opportunities available at the airport, including the Heathrow Engineering Apprenticeship scheme. It provides an enjoyable and practical way for young people to explore science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM subjects), and helps them develop skills for the world of work including communications, team working and confidence building.
Research by Engineering UK2 shows that whilst the average starting salary for engineering graduates is 16 per cent more than the average graduate salary, there is still a shortage of engineering graduates. The organisation estimates that the UK needs to double the number of recruits into engineering to meet demand. Yet just 20 per cent of 12-16 year olds express any knowledge of what people working in engineering do, and just 3% of all GCSEs taken in 2012 were in physics - a key subject for those wishing to study engineering at university.
Nigel Milton, Heathrow Policy Director, says: ‘There is a wide range of exciting engineering opportunities at Heathrow. We want to ensure the talented young people on our doorstep are aware of these careers and inspired to choose the STEM subjects needed to succeed in them.’
35 sessions will be run throughout April and May in the following schools:
- Thomas Knyvett College, Spelthorne
- Thamesmead School, Spelthorne
- Harlington Community School, Hillingdon
- Queensmead School, Hillingdon
- Northwood School, Hillingdon
- Abbotsfield School for boys, Hillingdon
- Ellen Wilkinson, Ealing
- Villiers High School, Ealing
- Greenford High School, Ealing
- Rivers Academy, Hounslow
- Chiswick School, Hounslow
- The Green School, Hounslow
- Gunnersbury Catholic School, Hounslow
- Slough Grammar School, Slough
- Westgate School, Slough
1Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics
2 Engineering UK Report 2013: http://www.engineeringuk.com/_resources/documents/EUK_Executive_Summary_2013_Web.pdf
