The start of October saw our team attend the highly successful 3-day PPMA Total Show at the NEC in Birmingham. Many of the 8,500 show attendees visited our stand, complete with show car, along with students from specially invited secondary schools and members of the public.
What is the PPMA Show?
The PPMA Show is run annually by the Process and Packaging Machinery Association (PPMA). Although it may seem an unusual show for Bloodhound to attend, it’s full of innovative engineering displays and ideas, and attracts huge numbers of engineers and technical personnel.
In 2014, the PPMA set up an independent trust called PPMA BEST, which focusses on business, education, skills and training. Many PPMA members have STEM outreach programmes, so on the final day the show ran a special Education Day and invited secondary school students who members have been working with over the past year.
STEM students head to Bloodhound
Bloodhound was a popular stand for the students, all of whom were studying STEM-related subjects including science, design and engineering. They particularly enjoyed having a go on the Bloodhound Driving Experience, virtual reality simulator and building air powered rocket cars from K’Nex.
Bloodhound STEM Communicator Mike Ford gave a presentation to the students as part of the Education Day seminar programme. Entitled “What’s Not Possible”, this was an interactive and entertaining technical résumé that highlighted real-life engineering challenges, with subject matter including space (from Apollo to the Space Shuttle) and, of course, breaking the world land speed record with Bloodhound LSR.
Mike’s talk was followed by a lively Q&A. “The students, who were obviously very engaged, asked some super questions!”
Promoting educational outreach
Shows such as this are important for demonstrating the value of educational outreach. Many of the organisations and companies at the show have outreach programmes, so we were delighted to discuss with them how Bloodhound could fit in with their efforts.
“I used to visit this show when I was engineering director at Campbell’s Soup,” explained Mike. “How things have changed!”
If your company would like to discuss how Bloodhound can fit into your education outreach programme, please get in touch.
More Ambassadors please!
We were very ably supported at the show by an enthusiastic group of Ambassadors. Without them, we couldn’t attend these events and share our inspirational activities with students, so we’d like to say a big thank you to all of them.
We are always looking for more people to join our pool of Ambassadors around the country. Education and Event Ambassadors are vital to the future of the charity and bring a wealth of industry experience, as well as awareness of STEM careers. Information about our Ambassadors’ activities also supports grant applications, which in turn enable us to continue our work.
If you would like to become an Ambassador or find out more about what the role entails, check out our Ambassador Programme page, which includes videos of our Ambassadors in action.