Using the seven pillars of STEM to create tomorrow’s workforce

Written by Jim Jack on August 19, 2024. Posted in News, Teaching and Learning, Uncategorized

The Labour government has made economic growth its top priority, but to drive this it will need to address skills shortages in the STEM sector which are holding us back to the tune of £1.5bn per year, writes Ann Marie Spry, our Vice Principal of Adults.

Colleges and higher education institutions like ours clearly play a vital role in addressing this problem – but not only through teaching the technical skills our learners need to succeed.

After analysing employer reports about recruitment in STEM fields a few years ago, what came over loud and clear was that while many of the students had the knowledge needed for the job, they didn’t have the necessary – and equally vital – behaviours.

So looking through a number of documents that mapped out the key characteristics that STEM employers were looking for, we whittled them down to create what we have called STEM 7. These are the attitudes and behaviours that underpin not just the science and tech industries but all kinds of jobs, from pastry chefs to fashion designers.

A skillset that transcends boundaries

STEM 7 consists of: creative thinking, problem-solving, communication, collaborative working, intellectual curiosity, flexibility and data-driven decision making. Just about all of those concepts are actually relevant regardless of the subject. Everybody these days has to use digital technology and maths in one way or another, and if you think of the design approach and problem-solving inherent to engineering, most jobs require creativity too.

Our challenge, as educators, is to ensure our curriculum provides opportunities for students to step out of their comfort zones and take on tasks in some of those STEM 7 areas they may struggle with. Engineers, for example, are known for having many important qualities – including problem-solving and, through their design approach, creativity. But they are not traditionally renowned for their collaborative approach or communication skills, both of which are  invaluable in the workplace.

That’s something our approach can help students with before they join the world of work, by stretching and developing them to ensure they have some of those transferable skills that businesses of all types really value.

And we know it’s working. We included some of our partner employers, like tech consultancy BJSS, in the first discussions about our STEM 7 strategy to make sure they were on board, and they’ve been nothing but supportive.

Opening minds

Introducing this concept has meant challenging both ourselves and our students to broaden how we think about STEM. As someone with a science background I feel strongly that many people tend to have a fear of ‘science’ and the STEM subjects, but that’s something we can and will change because it’s all around us in everything we do daily. 

One key way of doing so is through revising how we teach and moving away from the thoroughly unhelpful old perspective that saw technical and artistic courses as being entirely separate. Thankfully, there is an increasing awareness that both disciplines depend on each other and share many underlying principles, not least when it comes to creativity and intellectual curiosity.

The shorthand for this new perspective is STEAM (essentially, STEM plus the Arts) and Computer Game Design and Development is a classic example of STEAM in action. We teach the subject at Leeds City College as part of our very broad offering from the School of Creative Arts, at Quarry Hill campus – and it is the epitome of a field where technical know-how and creativity are equally important.

An immersive approach

Combined with this more open-minded perspective on what actually constitutes a STEM topic is the need to exploit emerging immersive technologies like AI and VR.

Such tools can offer great benefits to our students and the industries they want to enter. If you are studying healthcare, for example, you really want to learn on a hospital ward and we can offer that; indeed it will be one of the many new facilities that Harrogate College will provide following its £22m rebuild.

What VR does though, is give you so many additional options – in this case it allows you to change ward layouts, for example, and patient scenarios so that students are exposed to a wider set of challenges and leave college with a deeper understanding of what their jobs will entail.

We are already successfully using VR in welding at Keighley College, while across our group emerging technologies are helping us enhance the teaching of everything from science to electric vehicle infrastructure.

By combining these high-tech teaching aids with a STEM 7 approach, which also delivers those in-demand ‘softer skills’, we will start to plug those STEM-shaped holes in  the country’s economy.

This thought leadership piece was recently published in FE Week.

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Making the sums add up on the nation’s numeracy challenge

Written by Jim Jack on November 24, 2023. Posted in News

Maths is high on the current political agenda, with a focus on the young. But a lack of basic numeracy is blighting the lives of millions of adults, writes Ann Marie Spry, Vice Principal of Adults at Luminate Education Group.

Numeracy, the ability to understand how maths works in the real world, influences most aspects of our lives – from budgeting for shopping to mortgage choices.

Yet a shockingly high proportion of adults in the UK really struggle to deal with numbers – with a 2022 report finding that, in West Yorkshire, more than half – 52% – had numeracy skills at ‘entry level and below’.

This problem is limiting countless people’s lives, not least by closing off work opportunities across all kinds of sectors. Because a grasp of basic maths, as part of the STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths) skill set, is vital to so many jobs – and not just the ‘usual suspects’ like finance, accountancy or computing.

Our numeracy woes are also causing real economic damage which, according to research by National Numeracy, could be costing the UK up to £25 billion a year. A new YouGov survey commissioned by the same charity found that there are currently 15 million people in the UK with ‘low skills or confidence’ in maths – with lower paid workers, the unemployed and part-time workers worst affected.

So how do we go about reaching, and helping, those who need it?

The benefits of a functional approach

That is a question that the government’s Multiply programme, which invests in courses for adults that focus on functional, rather than theoretical, maths was set up to help answer. The scheme involves working with educational and skills organisations, like ours, to boost people’s confidence with numbers and gain qualifications.

We were delighted earlier this year to be awarded nearly £480,000 for two of our group’s members, Leeds City College (which was awarded £434,000) and Keighley College (£45,500), to deliver Multiply training in West Yorkshire.

This funding is enabling us to put on new courses for adults that are tailored to fit around their busy lives, while training more staff to teach numeracy.

These sessions are concentrating on topics like banking, borrowing and interest levels to highlight the practical benefits of numerical skills, and targeting adults who don’t have a Level 2 qualification – roughly equivalent to a GCSE grade 4, or the old C grade – in maths.

We hope that through delivering the programme we can help adults in all walks of life develop improved financial skills: from planning their meals, or creating shopping lists and budgets, to understanding taxes, pensions and interest rates. This should help them to feel more secure as they plan for the future by enabling them to feel more in control, and give them confidence to explore new challenges.

In a way our aim is to correct a historical wrong, as so many of our young people have left – and are still leaving – school feeling intimidated, and fearful, about numbers. That can have far-reaching, negative consequences throughout life: unless we reach out and try to remedy the problem.

Practical skills for the cost-of-living crisis

Our work is still at an early stage but we know, from other schemes around the country – including in Staffordshire – that Multiply courses are delivering very tangible benefits: not least by empowering individuals to cope with the many challenges that are being thrown up by the cost-of-living crisis, through managing their household budgets, bills and debts, better.

The government has been in the headlines this year for talking, as part of its wider push to update a whole raft of educational qualifications, about the importance of getting everyone to study maths until the age of 18. That idea was referenced again, as part of Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s proposals for a new Advanced British Standard, in the November 2023 King’s Speech, which stated that the new qualification would ‘ensure every young person studies some form of English and maths to age 18, raising the floor of attainment’.

That idea, given the link between numeracy and future life prospects, certainly has real merit – though proper funding will be needed to recruit and retain the maths teachers required to deliver it.

But we also, as a nation, have to make sure we don’t forget about the millions of people who have already been through the school system and yet don’t have the skills needed to help them fulfil their potential.

That is why the Multiply scheme, and the work further education providers around the country are doing thanks to its funding, is so important. Too many of our citizens, for far too long, have had to struggle due to a lack of number skills and this is costing them, and our economy, dear.

Whichever way you look at it, that just doesn’t add up.

This thought piece was recently published in The Yorkshire Post.

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