Forth Valley College’s very own superheroes have swooped in to win a top prize at the College Development Network’s annual awards ceremony.
Suzy the Scientist, Tim the Technician, Eric the Engineer and Mandy the Maths Buff – otherwise known as the Famous Four – were the focus of an awards submission for the Essential Skills category that blasted away the judges on the evening of Thursday 21 November at the Radisson Blu Hotel in Glasgow
The winning submission centres on how the ‘Famous Four Save the Planet’, through FVC’s Primary Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (STEM) project.
The project provides an innovative and engaging set of online learning resources and activities, along with active and lively face-to-face experiences for primary school pupils, delivered by an enthusiastic team of College staff and students. The aim of the project is to enthuse and empower teachers and pupils in developing their essential STEM capacity and skills.
Recognising a need for this in schools, the College built into its curriculum plans for 2018-2019 dedicated staff resource in a Primary STEM team. Some of the College’s own students have also been involved in the initiative as STEM Ambassadors for the college. The Team also created a suite of comprehensive, age appropriate and topical STEM activities, that are also available online, and go out to schools to deliver the most challenging activities face-to-face.
From this, Famous Four Save the Planet was born. They developed the four characters to help the young participants work through a range of topical activities, such as global warming, renewable energy, and recycling, to complete different challenges and save the world.
Famous Four Save the Planet, is a win, win, win for Essential Skills as it takes a broad view of Essential Skills and brings together the thinking around Skills 4.0 and the Scottish Government’s STEM Strategy.
Through this the College is delivering STEM learning to more than 600 Forth Valley primary school children from 20 schools, developing the confidence and capacity of their teachers and providing students with experiences that enable them to develop their skills for the future.
This is something that superheroes everywhere would be proud to be a part of!