Sustained contact with school children is more critical than reaching out to as many schools as possible, Arup’s chair for UK, India, Middle East and Africa Dervilla Mitchell has said.
“We have to gain children’s interest at primary school level so that they study the STEM subjects there is a possibility of them following a career in engineering,” said Mitchell.
However, she added during an interview for NCE’s Innovative Thinker article in the in the August issue that the civil engineering industry also needs to look at how it delivers this outreach too.
“We need to help the population in general understand that a career in engineering is a very worthwhile career,” she said. “It is an evolving area to work in and very rewarding – it will allow them to address the issues of today.
“One of our UK offices was doing outreach was working with up to 50 schools over the course of a year. Then they became involved with some research looking at how to be computer science engineering, which found you should visit each school seven times in a year so they are now working with fewer schools in order to add impact to what they do.”
According to Mitchell, ensuring the outreach the sector delivers is critical to the success of the work and ensuing the industry can meet the future demand for skills.
She also suggested that the industry needs to collaborate more on STEM. “There are hundreds of organisations working on advancing the cause of STEM and promoting engineering but perhaps they need to coalesce to become more impactful,” she said.
“We have to gain children’s interest at primary school level so that they study the STEM subjects there is a possibility of them following a career in engineering,” said Mitchell.
However, she added during an interview for NCE’s Innovative Thinker article in the in the August issue that the civil engineering industry also needs to look at how it delivers this outreach too.
“We need to help the population in general understand that a career in engineering is a very worthwhile career,” she said. “It is an evolving area to work in and very rewarding – it will allow them to address the issues of today.
“One of our UK offices was doing outreach was working with up to 50 schools over the course of a year. Then they became involved with some research looking at how to be computer science engineering, which found you should visit each school seven times in a year so they are now working with fewer schools in order to add impact to what they do.”
According to Mitchell, ensuring the outreach the sector delivers is critical to the success of the work and ensuing the industry can meet the future demand for skills.
She also suggested that the industry needs to collaborate more on STEM. “There are hundreds of organisations working on advancing the cause of STEM and promoting engineering but perhaps they need to coalesce to become more impactful,” she said.
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