Jon Excell

C2I 2017: Disaster movie STEM festival teaches science by stealth

In-Depth

Devising a survival strategy for a 'disaster movie' scenario was the key to engaging the residents of a deprived community in London with engineering ideas and concepts

Collaborate To Innovate 2017

Category: Young innovator engagement

Winner: SmashfestUK Survival Village and Young Explainer Programme

Partners: SmashfestUK; Middlesex University; University of Greenwich;

The Refinery

Category Sponsor: Renishaw

Earlier this year, residents of Deptford in South East London – one of the UK’s most deprived communities – faced up to a terrifying, and, thankfully, fictional, scenario: the impending eruption of a super-volcano that threatened the very survival of humanity.

With the clock ticking, a group of young people and their families worked alongside visiting engineers, scientists and artists to plot a strategy for survival; to figure out how they might help rebuild society after this catastrophe; and to explore the role that engineering would play in this effort.

disaster

This remarkable event was the centrepiece of SmashFestUK, a week-long STEM and arts festival hung around the concept of an impending disaster designed to show young people and their families how engineering, science and the arts underpin everything that we take for granted.

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