The Inspire Sustainability team and the MAKERS project are pairing with the University of Bristol to support the delivery of several engineering skills workshops to the young community of St Pauls.
The series of weekly free workshops are aimed at young people from the community, and look to provide a chance to learn key engineering skills from local experts. The team behind the workshops hope to raise aspirations, and allow the young people a chance to learn from expert members from their own community, in a safe and secure environment.
The workshops are taking place in the Malcolm X Centre in St Pauls, and have been organised and supported by the staff at the Malcolm X, with input from members of the community itself. The UWE team and the University of Bristol team are aiding in the organisation and planning of the workshops, as well as providing facilitators and UWE staff to run some of the upcoming sessions and share their expertise.
This week, the first of the sessions took place. Several young people from the community were invited to have a go at some soldering and electronics, whilst opening up a broader conversation about their skills and what’s needed to succeed in an engineering career. UWE Bristol technician Will Hadrill led the session in which the young people were tasked with putting together and soldering an electronic buzzer-wire game. It proved a really enjoyable and valuable experience for the young people.
One of the young people, an A-Level engineering student in Filton Abbeywood hoping to learn more about career pathways, had never done soldering before and found the session really fun and enjoyable.
Future workshops are covering a wide range of topics including coding, computer-aided-design, and e-scooter maintenance.
To find out more about these sessions, contact the Inspire Sustainability team on engineeringourfuture@uwe.ac.uk