Education

Winning schools announce big STEM plans

<h2>More than 400 schools&comma; including primary&comma; intermediate and secondary schools from Northland to Southland applied for funding from the &dollar;50&comma;000 Genesis School-gen Trust&period;<&sol;h2>&NewLine;<h3>Six schools will receive STEM &lpar;science&comma; technology&comma; engineering and math&rpar; equipment packages and one school a solar equipment package from its initial pool of &dollar;50&comma;000&period;<&sol;h3>&NewLine;<p>The Trust is a new charity that provides schools with solar&comma; science&comma; technology&comma; engineering and math equipment to help rangatahi &lpar;young people&rpar; solve real-world problems&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The first school recipients were selected based on their desire to shift students from being consumers of technology to creators&comma; the potential to involve the wider community in the learning journey and the intention to engage students in real-world problem solving&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>In alphabetical order&comma; the schools are&colon;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<ul>&NewLine;<li>Bradford School&comma; Otago<&sol;li>&NewLine;<li>Corinna School&comma; Wellington<&sol;li>&NewLine;<li>Manurewa South&comma; Auckland<&sol;li>&NewLine;<li>Maungatapu School&comma; Bay of Plenty<&sol;li>&NewLine;<li>Otamatea High School&comma; Northland &lpar;solar&rpar;<&sol;li>&NewLine;<li>Pukenui School &lpar;Houhora&rpar;&comma; Northland<&sol;li>&NewLine;<li>Tamatea High School&comma; Hawkes Bay<&sol;li>&NewLine;<&sol;ul>&NewLine;<p>Otamatea High School will use its solar equipment package in conjunction with the Genesis School-gen educational resources and integrate the learnings across as many subject areas as possible&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Equipment provided to the other six schools includes electronic devices such as laptops&comma; Chrome books and iPads as well as coding and robotics equipment&period; Science equipment packs cover chemistry&comma; physics and biology&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Genesis School-gen Trust Chair&comma; Lee Mauger&comma; said the level of interest in the Trust far exceeded expectations&period; &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;We knew some schools needed support for their science&comma; technology&comma; engineering and math teaching plans&comma; which is why we set up the Genesis School-gen Trust&period; However&comma; we were overwhelmed by the number of schools demonstrating real and pressing needs&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<blockquote>&NewLine;<p>&&num;8220&semi;We are delighted to have started to address this by helping seven schools in this first round of funding&comma; and would like to recognise Genesis’ ongoing support&comma; which will allow us to open another round of funding applications on 1 July 2019&period;&&num;8221&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<&sol;blockquote>&NewLine;<p>The Genesis School-gen Trustees&comma; including education&comma; IT and energy-generation experts&comma; determined which schools receive equipment packages&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Genesis contributed &dollar;50&comma;000 towards the first funding round and from August&comma; will be inviting customers to donate to the charity by adding a small amount to their monthly energy bill&period; In addition&comma; Genesis covers all administration costs so that 100&percnt; of donations go to schools for equipment&period; <&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Genesis CEO Marc England says that by enabling young New Zealanders to access classroom equipment and solar panels the Trust is ensuring more school-aged students have <a class&equals;"wpil&lowbar;keyword&lowbar;link" href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;www&period;schoolnews&period;co&period;nz&sol;2015&sol;10&sol;developing-opportunities-at-school-with-a-view&sol;" title&equals;"opportunities" data-wpil-keyword-link&equals;"linked" target&equals;"&lowbar;blank">opportunities<&sol;a> to examine and find solutions for real-world problems&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<blockquote>&NewLine;<p>&OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;This programme will eventually benefit all of us&comma;” says Marc&period; &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;It’s not just for Kiwi kids today&comma; but for the future of work that they’ll help make a reality&period; Increasingly&comma; science&comma; maths&comma; engineering and technology skills are in demand and as an organisation that relies on these skills&comma; we know how vital they are to our future&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<&sol;blockquote>&NewLine;<p>&&num;8220&semi;The same is true across New Zealand if we are to manage through the increased level of automation coming into the workplace&comma; sometimes known as the 4th industrial revolution&comma; our children will need the skills to adapt to jobs that don’t exist today&period; STEM skills will make a difference to all our futures&period;”<&sol;p>&NewLine;

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