ESMS and the Spartans Community Foundation Partnership

This term, our S6 STEM Ambassadors have been teaming up with the Spartans Community Foundation to run the after school science club at St David’s Primary. Spartans education team have been absolutely brilliant partners and as their education officers are already embedded in the local primary schools they have been able to organise the logistics involved in putting on the club. Even more importantly, they know the children well and can keep everyone focused and excited to learn. That has meant our S6 students are able concentrate fully on planning and leading the weekly CREST award sessions, which both they and the pupils have thoroughly enjoyed. Syd, one of our fantastic S6 STEM Ambassadors, shared her reflections of this great project.

‘For the past eight weeks, a group of students and I have been going to St David’s Primary School every Tuesday to run science sessions with a class of Primary 3 pupils. As STEM Ambassadors we have been working in partnership each week with the Spartans Community Foundation. Our aim has been to give the children the chance to get involved in hands-on chemistry, physics, and biology while helping them work toward their Star CREST Award. Each week we carried out a new experiment, and the pupils had the opportunity to take on the role of investigators by making hypotheses, planning their methods, and eventually drawing conclusions. It’s been amazing seeing how the activities link to concepts that they recognise from everyday life, making science feel more familiar and exciting.

Taking part in this project has been a really rewarding experience for all of us. We’ve come to know the pupils well, and building connections with them has made mentoring even more enjoyable. Both the planning and running of the experiments have taught us a lot about working with younger years, especially when we’ve had to adapt quickly to unexpected outcomes or the kids’ creative approaches. We occasionally struggled to retain their focus throughout the activities, but we learned how to adjust our style to keep everyone involved and engaged. Personally, I feel I’ve grown in confidence and developed real skills in teaching, communication and teamwork. Seeing the pupils become more curious, enthusiastic, and proud of their work each week has made the whole experience so worthwhile.’