On Thursday 19 – Friday 20 January Miss Tweddle accompanied three Year 8 students to Newcastle University who had been selected to take part in their annual ‘Night at the Museum’ event. This event is designed to give Year 8 students an insight into University life and to inform them about University courses and opportunities, as well as developing team work and leadership skills.
Chloe Bell (8AHO), John-James Glaister (8AHO) and Kirstie Williams (8DWI), were included in the 150 Year 8 students selected from 30 schools across the UK to take part in this event – where they worked in groups with a range of other Year 8 students and current Newcastle University Student Ambassadors.
As part of the event – Chloe, John-James and Kirstie enjoyed a trip around the university campus, sampled a range of university lectures and subject sessions – including Archaeology, Philosophy, Maths, Psychology, Sciences and Engineering. They also took part in a range of hands-on activities including – a zoo lab, where they held a range of live creatures including giant African land snails, bearded dragons and a royal python. Street science in which students were involved in a range of experiments and learnt about bacteria, circus skills,’ junk music jam’ and a visit to the planetarium. This was all before bedding down in their sleeping bag to sleep in the ‘Great North Hancock Museum’ – in among the artefacts and displays.
The second day of activities saw Chloe, John-James and Kirstie working together with seven other students to produce their own University Society. The students had to create and market their own University society – creating a stand, banners, t-shirt and promotional material. This concluded in a University ‘Society Fair’ – whereby students voted for the Society they would most like to join, if they were on offer at Newcastle University. There were 15 different societies that had been produced by different groups of students and Chloe, John- James and Kirstie’s ‘Sky Diving Society’, gained the most votes from fellow students – winning first place at the society fair! All three students came away with a £10 High Street Shopping Voucher for their achievement.
Chloe, John-James and Kirstie were all fantastic ambassadors for Workington Academy throughout their time at the event and are already looking forward to further opportunities relating to higher education and attending university in the future.
Well Done!
Chloe Bell (8AHO)
My favourite parts of the trip were walking around the university campus and the university and gaining an insight into university life through meeting current students. I enjoyed meeting new people and working with others. The whole experience was really fun and I’m glad that I went”.
John-James Glaister (8AHO)
“My favourite activities were the planetarium and the circus skills activities, as they were both new experiences to me. I also enjoyed the tour around the university – which was massive! I would really recommend this visit to next year’s Year 8 students – it was really fun and will help you find out a lot more about university.”
Kirstie Williams (8DWI)
“My favourite subject sessions and activities were the optical illusions session and the zoo lab activity, even though holding the giant African snails and royal python was pretty scary. I am glad that I went on this trip as it has given me an insight into what university is like and the student ambassadors that we worked with were all very kind and helpful – giving us lots of useful information regarding university and making it a really enjoyable experience.”