STEM Day at Imperial

Year 8 girls from across the Girls’ Day School Trust came together for a STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Maths) conference at Imperial College for an exciting day of talks and activities.

Over the course of the day, the girls learnt about inspiring STEM careers in a world class university environment, networked with fellow GDST pupils and shared ideas for how to promote STEM in their own schools, qualifying for a STEM Student Ambassador Bronze Award in the process. Clarissa and Talia report back on their highlights of the day:

‘Despite the pouring rain, we arrived in South Kensington and got off to a great start with an inspiring talk from the first British astronaut and the first woman to visit the Mir Space Station: Helen Sharman OBE. She gave an impressive speech about her journey from working in research development on Mars chocolate bars to working in space. She talked about the fascinating experiments that she did in relation to testing how to grow food in space and explained how life in the spaceship works.

The rest of the day communicated the diversity and range of possible STEM jobs, with a carousel of lectures on different types of sciences, from Geoscience to Material Science and Bioengineering, including the latest developments in prosthetics. After lunch, we learnt how to be successful STEM ambassadors and brainstormed ideas on how to encourage our classmates to get more involved in STEM subjects. Everybody had an amazing time and we left feeling motivated and inspired – we would love to do it again next year as official STEM ambassadors!’

The ‘GDSTEM’ Day is spearheaded by our very own Assistant Head Teaching & Learning, Mrs Bernstein, one of our Science teachers who is the Consultant STEM Lead across the Girls’ Day School Trust.  At South Hampstead, there is strong take-up and achievement in STEM subjects – girls take all three Sciences to GCSE and Mathematics is the most popular A Level choice. Imperial College researcher Dr Jess Wade, who champions women in Physics by writing Wiki entries for under-represented female Scientists, commented: “I was exceptionally lucky to discover my love for science under the guidance of inspirational teachers at South Hampstead High School.”