Bloodhound Education Ambassador Graham Pay recently visited Guernsey and Jersey in the Channel Islands, where he took the Bloodhound story into local schools. He also gave a talk to members of each island’s Channel Island Group of Professional Engineers (CIGPE), who generously funded his visit.
Graham Pay travelled further than most to deliver his first talks as a new Bloodhound Ambassador when he crossed the Channel to visit schools in Guernsey and Jersey in September. However, having grown up on Guernsey, he had a particular interest in taking the story into local schools there following an invitation from the CIGPE.
“I’d given talks to the CIGPE members before on other aspects of engineering,” said Graham. “So when they invited me back to talk about any topic I chose, it made sense to suggest I talk about Bloodhound, given that I’d recently volunteered as an Ambassador.”
“I had the new presentation from the Bloodhound Education team to take with me and it was really successful! We had good turnouts in both Guernsey and Jersey, with excellent questions posed by the students, who were aged from 12 upwards.”
Flying visits
On Guernsey, Graham visited the island’s Grammar School for a lunchtime presentation, and then went to the College of Further Education to talk to around 50 students. He then repeated the presentation in the evening to around 60 members of the island’s branch of the CIGPE.
“Graham provided a very interesting presentation on the background to the Bloodhound land speed record attempt,” said Adam Greening of Guernsey Electricity. “CIGPE regularly attends the College of Further Education to provide students with enrichment related to STEM subjects, and events like this inspire them to aim high and be the best engineers they can be. They found the talk incredibly interesting!”
Graham then flew to Jersey where he went to Victoria College, one of the island’s independent boys’ schools, and presented to students plus a group of girls from a nearby school. This presentation was videoed to allow it to be shared in other schools. Again, he repeated the presentation to a large group of local CIGPE members in the evening.
Both students and CIGPE members were very enthusiastic about the project and keen to learn more. The students in particular were interested in a range of areas relating to Bloodhound, including how the car was designed to minimise risks to driver Andy Green and what technical spinoffs there may be from the car and the project.
More please sir!
“For my first outing I really enjoyed it,” reported Graham. “I had good audiences who were genuinely interested in Bloodhound and asked lots of questions – it was good fun!”
Graham now plans to return to the Channel Islands with additional resources and props that will allow him to offer wider, hands-on experiences to students at the schools and colleges.
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We always need more Ambassadors! Find out more about what they do and how to join us on our Ambassador Programme page.