Primary Engineer in Scotland
Primary Engineer brings together teachers and engineers to engage primary and secondary pupils with engineering via curriculum mapped projects. The aim is that engineers will provide the context for the projects and enable pupils and teachers to understand more about the diversity and excitement of engineering.
Promoting engineering with Primary Engineer
The Scottish Engineering Leaders Award
The Scottish Engineering Leaders Award is an annual competition for 3-19 year olds centred around the question “If you were an engineer what would you do?”. It seeks to challenge school children to think of a problem and come up with an engineering-based solution to this after interviewing an engineer.
Entries are collated and engineers are invited to help at Grading Days to read and grade entries which will be shortlisted for a final award panel and put on public display at the University of Strathclyde in June.
The University of Strathclyde built one of the first prototypes – the Shopping Trolley for the Elderly which can be seen at Glasgow Science Centre.
Past Prototeam builds include the Rollover Bench which allows you to always find a dry seat, the Winter Walker – an innovative Zimmer frame for elderly people to cope with the icy winters in Scotland and in 2019 Glasgow Caledonian University Prototeam built the Flat Pack Wind Turbine for refugee camps! who go on to bring the design to life.
Engineers form a crucial part of the Leaders Award; from spending an hour being interviewed in a school to being a judge and volunteering time to read the submitted entries and whittle them down from 17,000 (in Scotland for 2018/19) to winners in each year group.
Primary Engineer and Secondary Engineer Training Courses for Teachers and invited Engineers
Engineers provide context for the projects Primary Engineer deliver to teachers so they can deliver in the classroom. If you wish to support this programme you can register to attend the training days, support the teachers and then organise when to visit the school to contextualise the learning. We do ask that you do not teach the project but support the teacher – an expert in the room.
Every engineer has varying amounts of time they can devote to helping the schools, it’s between the engineer and the school to agree what length of support this should be.
Not all engineers who wish to be involved can attend the training day, but they are still welcome to link to schools - Primary Engineer will help link engineers to schools who are registered and provide all the introductions necessary.
What’s your benefit?
Developing your communication skills in an environment with mixed audiences – children and teachers. You will be required to articulate your profession and engineering generally to small children and young people. This can be used as evidence for the D Competencies in UK-Spec.
Primary Engineer will provide certificates to acknowledge engagement.
Do you have engineers who would like to volunteer to be judges at our Primary Engineer Celebration Events, or to go into a school are contextualise engineering for children?
Are you an engineer yourself who would like to get involved?
This is a wonderful opportunity to get involved with the Primary Engineer Programmes by engaging with children and their engineering projects. If you would like to get involved with Primary Engineer, please visit their website – www.primaryengineer.com, www.leadersaward.com www.secondaryengineer.com or contact them for more details - info@primaryengineer.com.