An early start in early January as four members of WES headed to our first outreach event of 2017, Corsham School STEM day. Jemma, Beth, Elizabeth and Emma left the Bath Campus equipped with all you need to build marble runs with 60 Year 9 teenagers; card, straws, sticks and plenty of chocolate!
The idea was to build a marble run in teams using only the materials provided and a table leg for support. Points were awarded according to the number of turns in the run, the time the marble spent in the run and if the marble completed the whole course. The winning team got dibs on the packets of chocolate we’d brought with us.
It was great to see the competitive spirit come out as teams designed and built their runs to outscore those of their classmates. Once time was called, and the last cheeky bit of Sellotape added, the WES team came round to score the courses. There were some great designs with ingenious ways to slow the marble down. Some worked fantastically, some … didn’t.
At the end of each session there was even time to have a quick chat with the students. We put about to challenge any misconceptions they had about what engineers do as well as describing a little about what we do in our daily work.
One of the highlights of the day was reading the comments on our post-it comment wall, lots of positive comments and often a very funny read!
Huge thanks to Corsham School for having us and of course for the great lunch!
Beth Charles
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