Schools Programme Impact 2024/25

As our schools programme for 2024/25 comes to an end, we wanted to say how extremely grateful we are for all the pupils, students and school staff who have worked with us over the academic year! We’ve been incredibly busy but have thoroughly enjoyed every single activity and meeting all those who have taken part in them.

We are very proud that 4314 children and young people engaged in our schools programme in 2024/25 from nurseries, primary schools, secondaries, colleges/sixth forms, special schools and alternative provisions across Nottingham and Nottinghamshire. 

Here’s what they got up to:

Primary Parliament 

387 pupils from 38 Nottingham primary schools engaged in Primary Parliament over 9 sessions focusing on why their voices matter and using them to share important thoughts and ideas on issues such as public safety, racism, fairtrade, welcoming refugees and Nottingham pride.  Children worked with fantastic creative practitioners Jay Sandhu, Claire Finn and Heather Hodkinson on this project as well as the Ignite team and teams from East Midlands Climate Ambassadors, ChalleNGe, Nottingham City Council and Child Friendly Nottingham.  Find out more in our video from the Autumn term on Youtube. :

“If my ideas weren’t listened to it wouldn’t make me feel like people value me as a person, but when they are it can change how I feel about myself”  - Primary Parliamentarian 2024/25

Nottinghamshire Festival of Science and Curiosity (FOSAC)

70 schools took part in activities as part of the Nottinghamshire Festival of Science and Curiosity in February 2025.  This included 7 special schools who worked with chemists and researchers from UoN and NTU as part of our Come Alive with Chemistry project.  We also held 3 Real Science in Schools Symposia in Nottingham and Mansfield where young scientists from mainstream and SEND schools showcased their own research to their peers. As part of FOSAC, schools engaged in topics such as plant science, neuroscience, robotics, construction, physics, sustainability and animal care. 

“The activities were very engaging and the timings and pacing allowed everyone to engage with a variety of tasks.  There was a good range of activities that the children would never have come across before, and the teachers heard some great scientific discussions taking place.”  - Teacher

Curious Tots 

160 children aged 3-5 engaged in our Curious Tots programme across 5 nurseries based in Nottingham schools.  We also held a CPD session in March at Crabtree Farm Primary School and Nursery where we were joined by the team from Paul Hamlyn Foundation (the amazing funders of the project) to formally get everything started.  Each school involved in Curious Tots works with 1 creative practitioner per week within their nursery setting to bring more creativity to the Early Years learning framework through visual art, craft, music, theatre and play. 

"The children are more confident with people they are unfamiliar with and are more willing to go and have a chat. They also use more language in their play, especially in the creative area as they are exposed to more vocabulary."  - Teacher

Ada Lovelace Day 

258 children and young people attend our two Ada Lovelace Day events in October, one at BioCity at City Link and one at MediCity in Beeston, which were delivered in partnership with Pioneer Group. Young scientists joined us to learn about Ada Lovelace before meeting and taking part in activities led by 14 different STEM businesses based in Nottingham.  This work also spread across the UK with events at Pioneer Group sites in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Bedford and Kent who worked with us to reach a further 150 young people. 

“I really enjoyed the day. It was amazing, I loved it.  I loved all of the lessons. I do not have a favourite one. I learned so many things that I didn't know.”  - KS3 Student at MediCity

“Being a scientist is hard but fun” - Primary Student at BioCity 

A huge thank you goes to everyone who we have worked with this academic year to provide such a huge number of schools with high-quality and engaging creative learning experiences. There is plenty more to come in the 2025/26 academic year so please sign up to join us: 

Register for Primary Parliament

Register for FOSAC 2026

Sign up for our Schools Newsletter (termly)