During lockdown we have had to transfer a lot of school life to a virtual life, and this is happening within our Careers Development also.
Before half term, we heard from Professor Stephen Neethling of Imperial College.
He told students about Imperial College and University Life. He answered questions about what to expect when going to University and how Covid has affected university life and learning.
Willow Warneford one of the students from Year 13 said:
“We were able to learn about what we could expect at university regarding accommodation, student experience and personal learning. We also experienced what a university lecture would be like to help us prepare and access experience for university.”
“Personally, I found this particularly useful as I was not exactly sure what to expect when I arrived at university, it allowed me to prepare for the expectations of individual work. Mia Oakes, another attendee described the course as informative as it was an experience of university lectures that also linked really well with our current course in Sixth Form.”
“Overall, the call was highly informative and helped us learn about how our University Experience will be.”
Mike Farrer of BAE Systems talked about his career journey. He then gave a presentation on the history of Nuclear Physics and the Nuclear Industry.
This tied together the Particle Physics, Radioactivity and Nuclear Physics work and linked it to the local nuclear industry. It was also excellent preparation for our Turning Points in Physics Topic.
Mrs Kelso said “Thank you both very much for the time you have taken to talk to us and enrich our learning.”
Following on from that, this week we have welcomed two more guest speakers.
Mike Farrer joined us again from BAE Systems and this time Professor Andrew Starr from Cranfield University.
Students have been studying Electricity and the talks tied up with their current studies to show what the applications are and careers this could lead to.
The context initially was railway engineering, and students found out about electrical, electronic and system engineering.
Students heard about the latest research & development for fault finding and robotics systems in the rail industry.
They found out about the importance of life cycle and cost analysis. They found out about the qualifications required to go to a university like Cranfield which is a post graduate University and work on such cutting edge research projects.
Students asked Professor Starr what advice he would give to a Year 12 student and he told students to be open minded and not specialise too early. A broad degree would keep our options open. He went on to add that the future of vehicles would become very important in the next few years linking to electric and autonomous vehicles.
Mike Farrar them went on to talk about the systems involved in some of the technology he sees out of the office window at BAE.
The physics of the systems in actions demonstrates the vast range of specialities within Physics and how all the specialists work together to implement the research.
Kai Savage from Year 12 said: “Yesterdays talk was really interesting. It opened the possibility of going to university post graduate and also taught me not not put all my eggs in one basket and keep my education broad for as long as possible. I also found the railway technology quite interesting.”
Daniel Durlej also from Year 12 commented: “I found it very eye opening in the specific’s of the course and found it very interesting and I enjoyed finding out about the things associated with developing the automated repairs robot. And I was fascinated in finding out about the systems inner workings of the naval forces working together as one system with thousands of people and machines working together.”
