Projects

At NUSTEM we’ve had the pleasure of working with a wide range of funders along with academic colleagues and external partners over the years. This timeline brings all of our projects together in one place. A veritable trip through time!

2021 - 2022
Let’s do engineering
Let’s do engineering is a project led by Dr Helen Bridle from Heriot-Watt University. The project brings together engineering professionals, schools, nurseries, musicians, artists, storytellers and children to design fund and engaging engineering activities. All of the resources that are developed during the project will be available on the Let’s do engineering website.

NUSTEM is supporting Helen as she develops the project using our previous experience of working with young children and their families and knowledge of evaluating the impact of activities with this group.

NUSTEM Team: Carol Davenport, Joe Shimwell, Annie Padwick

External Partner: Dr Helen Bridle, Professor Thusha Rajendran

Funder: EPSRC Engagement Champions Award
2020 - 2023
Reading Sparks
Reading Sparks is a project led by The Reading Agency. The project will harness the proven power of reading to engage families with STEM, and bridge the gap in science capital for families from lower socio-economic groups, teenage girls and BME communities. There are 11 library services across England involved in the project: Barnsley, Coventry, Derbyshire, Halton, Hillingdon, Hull, Newham, Portsmouth, Suffolk, Swindon, and Torbay.

NUSTEM is working with The Reading Agency to develop activities for loan bags that the libraries will share with their visitors and supporting the work with young people. We are also involved in the governance and evaluation of the project.

NUSTEM Team: Joe Shimwell, Jonathan Sanderson, Carol Davenport

External partners: The Reading Agency, British Science Association

Funders: Arts Council England, Science and Technology Facilities Council

2020 - 2023
2020 - 2022
Union Chain Bridge: Crossing Borders, Inspiring Communities
The Union Chain Bridge project is a project to conserve the historically important Union Chain Bridge near Berwick, and to deliver an exciting programme of events, activities and learning opportunities. NUSTEM is working with Museums Northumberland on the development and delivery of the primary schools and family engagement activities.

You can find out more about the whole project, including some amazing drone footage of the bridge at the project website: Union Chain Bridge

NUSTEM Team: Joe Shimwell, Carol Davenport, Annie Padwick

External Partners: Museums Northumberland

Funders: National Lottery Heritage Fund, Northumberland County Council, Scottish Borders Council
2020 - 2022
Inventive
Professor Trevor Cox, from Salford University, is creating a podcast series – Inventive – which tells the stories of engineering. Using a fascinating mix of interviews with a diverse range of engineers, and fiction based on those interviews Inventive blends different voices together to create a new way of looking at engineers and engineering.

NUSTEM is working with the Inventive team to create curriculum materials linked to the engineers and the stories.

NUSTEM Team: Carol Davenport, Jonathan Sanderson, Antonio Portas

External Partners: Professor Trevor Cox, Adam Fowler, Anna Scott-Brown, Annabeth Robinson, Gill Davies

Funder: EPSRC

2020 - 2022
2019 - 2022
Our Past, Your Future
Using the NUSTEM primary schools partnership as a model, children, teachers and families from 15 primary schools in the North of Tyne region will learn about the heritage of the North East and look to the future of STEM in the region. There will also be a summer school based at Woodhorn Museum, visits to local companies and teacher CPD provided by Historic England.

You can find out more about the project, including an interactive map of North East Heritage, on the project webpage: Our Past, Your Future.

NUSTEM Team: Carol Davenport, Joe Shimwell, Jonathan Sanderson

External partners: Museums Northumberland, Historic England

Funder: North of Tyne Combined Authority
2019 – 2023
Connect
A collaboration with the making and tinkering experts at the Centre for Life, this three-year project will bring physical computing to families and communities across the region. Participants will add their own biological and technological distinctiveness to an ever-growing network of robots.

For more information, see the Connect pages.

NUSTEM Team: Jonathan Sanderson, Joe Shimwell, Carol Davenport, Annie Padwick
External partners: Centre for Life
Funder: North of Tyne Combined Authority

2019 – 2023
2019 - 2023
Tipping Points in Antarctic Climate Components (TiPPACs)
TiPPACs is a collaboration between five European partners. The project is investigating the possibility of sudden and large changes in different parts of the environment in Antarctica, particularly the relatively ‘warm’ water underneath some of the ice shelves, and the ice sheets themselves.

NUSTEM is supporting public engagement and training for researchers involved in the project.

The project lead at Northumbria University is Hilmar Gudmundsson.

Funder: European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement no.820575
2019 - 2022
SOLARNET
SOLARNET is a European Commission project aimed at fostering networking between around 600 European solar scientists, conducting joint research activity and supporting access to research infrastructures. Some of the activities in the project involve training in scientific principles and in public engagement. NUSTEM is working with Dr Richard Morton to support the outreach activities of the project.

Funder: European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 824135.

2019 - 2022
2019 – 2021
Me, You & Science Too
MYST is an early years literacy project sees us collaborate with one of our partner schools to develop and deliver a series of ten family workshops. The workshops involve reading a STEM-based story book and a linked practical activity.

We’re aiming to support the school in developing home-school links; empower parents to read more often with their children; normalise family discussion about STEM ideas; and research the effects of the project so we can subsequently share recommendations and best practice.

NUSTEM Team: Joe Shimwell, Annie Padwick, Mel Horan, Carol Davenport

External partner: Battle Hill Primary School

Funder: SHINE Trust,
2019 - 2021
Cacoon
We are working with Dr Paul Mann to develop activities exploring the impacts of climate change on Arctic ecosystems and communities. Local artist, Dominic Smith, has helped us to use photography to model permafrost melting in an understandable and highly visual fashion.

NUSTEM Team: Joe Shimwell, Carol Davenport

Academic: Paul Mann

External Partners: Helix Arts and Dominic Smith

Funded by: Natural Environment Research Council, through their Changing Arctic Oceans programme

2019 - 2021
2019 - 2021
Family Space Explorers 2
Building on the Family Space Explorers project, NUSTEM are working with local cultural venues to share the excitement of space exploration to a wider audience.

NUSTEM Team: Carol Davenport, Itoro Emembolu, Joe Shimwell

External partners: Life Science Centre, Great North Museum: Hancock, Success4All, Common Room of the Great North

Funder: UK Space Agency
2019 - 2021
MANAPRE
NUSTEM is collaborating with colleagues in the Department of Geography and researchers in Mexico City on the Mexico City Partnership on Health and Air Pollution Research and Engagement (MANAPRE). The project is looking at Air quality in Mexico City. NUSTEM have created a series of science and career lesson inserts for teachers in Mexico to use to teach their students about what air quality is, and how it can be improved. You can find the Spanish and English versions of the resources here.

NUSTEM Team: Antonio Portas, Carol Davenport

Northumbria University Academic Team: Anil Namdeo, Jane Entwistle, Lindsay Bramwell

Funded by: British Council Newton Fund

2019 - 2021
2019 - 2020
Tales of Engineering
Tales of Engineering connects professional engineers with pre-school children and their families and nursery children to share their love of engineering. At the end of the session, the children will take the book home with them.

NUSTEM Team: Antonio Portas, Mel Horan, Annie Padwick, Sonia Singh Chahal, Jonathan Sanderson, Carol Davenport

Engineer team: Vikash Kumar, Stewart Franks, Carolina Costa, Linzi Dodd, Paula McMahon, Harri Beatie, Talib Butt

Funder: Royal Academy of Engineering Ingenious Grant
2019 - 2020
Careers in Initial Teacher Education (CITE)
CITE is a study which provides training for trainee teachers and their mentors about careers in the primary school. The training consists of three sessions and gap task which explore unconscious bias, careers aspirations and employability characteristics in primary schools.

The training has also been used with other primary school teachers and was delivered both face to face and online.

NUSTEM team: Carol Davenport, Joe Shimwell, Annie Padwick

External partner: North East LEP

Funder: Careers and Enterprise Company

2019 - 2020
2019-2020
Geography: Past Present and Future
Geography: Past, Present and Future is a series of three workshops exploring climate change and environmental science with primary school children.

Academics from Northumbria University’s cold and palaeo-environment (CAPE) research group worked with NUSTEM to co-design and co-deliver workshops, and supported children to act as researchers to consider how environmental science can be used to see what the environment was like in the past, measure what’s happening now and predict what it will be like in the future.

NUSTEM Team: Joe Shimwell, Mel Horan, Annie Padwick, Itoro Emembolu

Academic Team: Leanne Wake, Matthew Pound, Kate Winter, Nick Rutter, Sebastian Rosier, John Woodward, Richard Morton

Funded by: Northumbria University
2018 - 2021
Exploring Extreme Environments (E3)
Exploring Extreme Environments (E3) uses science, poetry and art linked to the extreme environments found in the Sun and Antarctica to engage and educate children.

Towards the end of the project there will be an Antarctica-inspired community performance of poetry and sounds by Katrina Porteous (poet) and Peter Zinovieff (composer) to help showcase the amazing relationship between art and science.

NUSTEM Team: Carol Davenport, Annie Padwick, Joe Shimwell, Mel Horan, Jonathan Sanderson
Academic team: John Woodward, James McLaughlin, Richard Morton

External partners: Katrina Porteous, Peter Zinovieff, Helen Schell, Discovery Museum

Funder: STFC

2018 - 2021
2018 - 2020
Think Engineering #2
The Reece Foundation funds part of the NUSTEM primary partnership work, with a particular focus on showcasing engineering careers. The funding also supports NUSTEM Think Week – yearly summer schools for children aged 9 – 10.

Each year, the Reece foundation also supports a Northumbria Universtity Placement Student who works with NUSTEM for the whole year.

NUSTEM Team: Joe Shimwell, Mel Horan, Jonathan Sanderson, Carol Davenport, Annie Padwick

Placement Students: Dan Wilkinson, Luke Haworth, Sonia Singh Chahal, Bethany Willis

Funder: Reece Foundation
2018 - 2019
Union Chain Bridge Learning package
The Union Chain Bridge is a historic bridge near Berwick upon Tweed which was completed in 1820 and was then the longest chain suspension bridge in the World. Two hundred years on, the bridge was in need of refurbishment, and a partnership between Northumberland County Council, Scottish Borders Council, Museums Northumberland and supported by the Friends of the Union Chain bridge came together to bid for funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund.

As part of the preparation of that bid, NUSTEM drew up a vision for a STEM learning programme that would bring an understanding of the sicnece and engineering involved to children, teachers and families in schools within a 10 mile of Berwick.

NUSTEM Team: Jonathan Sanderson, Carol Davenport

External partners: Jane Miller, Anita Wan, Rowan Brown (Museums Northumberland)

Funder: Northumberland County Council / Heritage Lottery Fund

2018 - 2019
2017 - 2021
Ogden Outreach Officer
The Ogden Trust provide support for the Ogden Outreach Officer within NUSTEM. The officer provides physics specific support to pupils and teachers, as well as working with academic staff on public engagement projects.

NUSTEM team: Antonio Portas, Carol Davenport.

Academic team: Rodrigo Ledesma-Aguilar, Shaun Bloomfield

Funder: Ogden Trust
2017 - 2019
British Gear Association
Working with the industry association for gear specialists within mechanical engineering, we developed a practical workshop for primary schools and trained BGA members to deliver the workshop nationwide.

NUSTEM team: Joe Shimwell, Jonathan Sanderson, Carol Davenport

Funder: British Gear Association

2017 - 2019
2017 - 2018
Family Space Explorers
Family Space Explorers involved two family storytime activities based around the theme of space exploration. Using two books, one of which was written specifically for the project, families of pre-school children read a story and then did a simple building activity together using the story as a creative springboard. The sessions were delivered in local libraries and cultural venues. After the session, families were given a copy of the book to take home.

NUSTEM team: Carol Davenport, Joe Shimwell, Jonathan Sanderson, Luke Howarth

Funder: UK Space Agency
2017 - 2018
NECOP Careers Material Development
The North East Collaborative Outreach programme involved the five universities and 19 colleges in the North East region. As part of the special projects fund, NUSTEM created two teacher CPD sessions on careers in the curriculum and unconscious bias. We also wrote science topic worksheets using (mostly local) companies as a context that teachers could use in their classrooms.

NUSTEM Team: Carol Davenport, Jonathan Sanderson

External partners: Alom Shaha, James Brown, Anne Willis, Cathryn Arnold

Funding: HEFCE

2017 - 2018
2016 - 2018
Imagining the Sun
Imagining the Sun was a collaboration between a poet, a sound artist and a visual artist with Northumbria University’s solar physics research group, supported by NUSTEM. The project challenged public and schools audiences to explore how approaches from art and science can complement and inform each other. Alongside the schools programme was a series of public performances and exhibitions.

NUSTEM Team: Carol Davenport, Joe Shimwell, Sarah Hilton, Jonathan Sanderson

Academic team: John Woodward, The Solar Physics group including Richard Morton, Gert Botha, Valentina Zharkova, and James Mclaughlin,

External partners: Katrina Porteous, Helen Schell, Peter Zinovieff

Funded by: STFC (ST/N005562/1)
2016 - 2017
Engineering for Families
Engineering for Families is a 6-week family-learning course developed for primary school children and their parents/carers. Each session introduced families to a different branch of engineering, and allowed carers and children to create and build together in a relaxed atmosphere. The sessions were delivered at six schools in Blyth, and there was also teacher CPD so that the schools could continue to deliver the club themselves.

NUSTEM Team: Joe Shimwell, Dan Wilkinson, Carol Davenport, Antonio Portas

Funded by: Platten Family fund at the Community Foundation

2016 - 2017
2016 - 2017
Giant Waves in the Ocean: From Sea Monsters to Science
In this project NUSTEM collaborated with colleagues from the Maths department and a visual artist to explore the concept of creativity in art and mathematics in North East primary schools.

NUSTEM Team: Carol Davenport, Joe Shimwell

Academic team: Sara Lombardo, Matteo Sommacal, Benoit Huard

External partners: Gloria Ronchi

Funded by: Maths Forsees network
2016
A-level Practical Films
Working with physics teachers Alom Shaha and Christina Astin, NUSTEM produced a series of films for A-level Physics teachers. The films showed different ways to approach some of the required practicals in A-level Physics in England.

NUSTEM Team involved: Carol Davenport, Jonathan Sanderson

Funded by: Ogden Trust, Northumbria University

External partners: Physics Partners

2016
2015 - 2016
Tim Peake Primary Project
The Tim Peake Primary Project was developed around Tim Peake’s stay on the International Space Station. The project was led by STEM Learning and involved Space Ambassadors working in schools and with other organisations to share the excitement of space (and STEM more widely) with children.

NUSTEM worked with schools in the North East to deliver the project.

NUSTEM Team involved: Carol Davenport, James Brown, Joe Shimwell

Funder: ESERO-UK
2014 - 2017
Think Engineering #1
We developed a Maker Lab allowed us to purchase maker tools and equipment which could be used with young people either in Think Lab, or in schools and other venues. This meant that we could include lots of hands-on tinkering and making activities in partner schools. It also helped us to develop installations for Maker Faire to show engineering and design thinking in action.

Reece also funded three yearly summer schools for year 12 female students who were studying Maths and Physics at A-level (or equivalent) and considering Engineering at University. The three week long summer schools introduced the students to a range of local engineering companies and helped them to think about how they could make a difference in the world through STEM.

NUSTEM Team involved: Carol Davenport, Emma Garrick, Jonathan Sanderson, Joe Shimwell, Annie Padwick

Funder: Reece Foundation

2014 - 2017
2014–16
Explore Your Universe
Explore Your Universe was developed by the UK Association of Science and Discovery Centres (ASDC) and supported by STFC. The activities included science shows and workshops.

NUSTEM was part of the second phase of the project.

NUSTEM Team involved: Carol Davenport, Joe Shimwell, Sarah Hilton
2014
Think Physics – HEFCE Catalyst
We started as ‘Think Physics,’ an ambitious three-year iniative funded by the Higher Education Funding Council for England as a ‘Catalyst’ project. Our original aim was to increase the number of young people studying A-level physics and physics related degrees. However, we knew from the beginning that we had to plan for the longer term – about 20 years – to really see a change in the number of young people studying physics, and STEM subjects more widely.

NUSTEM Team involved: Everyone

2014

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