new folk to inspire

Catalyst is taking part in Halton's people into jobs programme which means we offer work placements to local people but they get paid by the council. So we have two new guys working with us for 6 months. Nathan is helping out Paul on the technical and handyman side and Alex is working with us in education. Alex is thinking about training to be a teacher - well he will certainly know whether he wants to teach or not by the time he has finished with us.
Yesterday was a baptism of fire - we had 250 year 7s from Cardinal Heenan school in Liverpool. I did three flash gang whoosh shows - huge fun! The boys were super and really enjoyed their day - they were very enthusiastic about the shows!
I think Alex and Nathan were a little overawed at so many kids all in one place but we had a good day and both of them came back today for more!
Today Alex put on a lab coat and certainly began to enjoy being a scientist - I hope he continues to enjoy this!

reviewing NSEW

Last week was very busy. National Science and Engineering week which lasts over 10 days here at Catalyst because we get so busy!
We started with Flash Bang Whoosh shows for secondary schools with a guest presenter thrown in on the Friday from King's school Macclesfield - thanks to the guys who came over - all three are as mad as they come but passionate about science and they certainly do a mean show!
Saturday was the world première for Alicia Cutler studying chemistry at Manchester Met. She presented her first ever science show - the magic of the movies. Saturday science club were the lab rats and I think they had a good time!Well done Alicia - I loved the sugar glass!!
The Ed team did another Flash Bang show for the public in the afternoon and lots of the morning gang stayed so a good time was had by all.
Monday was more secondary shows and then we changed gear for the primary shows - lots of liquid nitrogen and dry ice, burning iron filings and generally causing lots of oohs and aahs. Great fun and some really big audiences on some of the days. I think Wednesday and Friday broke the record for how many kids can you squash into a science show!!
So three very tired but happy science presenters finished the week with not quite a bang but certainly a whoosh!

Students visit

We had a group of student teachers visit us from Liverpool John Moores University. All the Education team were involved in leading sessions with them. Soap, fantastic plastic and a hands on in your classroom session.
I shared snippets from the RSC DVD we have been involved in making and we had a go at some experiments suitable and easy to do in primary classroom
Hopefully as they go out into schools on placement this week we will have inspired some of the students to have a go!