Work Experience Energises Pupils

Leamington Spa, United Kingdom, July 02, 2010 --(PR.com)-- From 21st to 25th June, nearly 40 students aged 14 and 15 from across the regions of the UK enjoyed a unique work experience event at the National Grid Training Centre near Newark, Nottinghamshire.

Run in conjunction with the UK’s largest utility company, National Grid, this brand new residential learning opportunity gave students an insight into the future of energy and the industry as a whole. During the course the lucky students worked with real engineers from National Grid to see first-hand how the supply of energy works. This included learning about the anatomy of the nation’s energy networks and taking a close up view of high-voltage substations, lines and cables.

Students also explored the scale of the ‘hardware’ used to keep our lights on and our gas flowing. This included a tour round a major power station to find out how electricity is generated and a visit to a gas compressor site to develop a deeper knowledge of how gas is moved around in volume.

Social activities included a film evening and a sports night. On the final night, The Smallpeice Trust and National Grid hosted a conference style dinner, attended by Nick Winser, Executive Director of Transmission at National Grid. Students and supervisors heard Nick speak about his career based on engineering, and had the opportunity to socialise and share their experiences of the week.

Richard Earp, National Grid’s education and skills manager said,
“We are delighted to have been able to offer this week in partnership with the Smallpeice Trust. It’s a new approach to work experience and one we are keen to develop further. As a major engineering employer we recognise our responsibility to help young people understand both where their science, maths and technology studies could lead them. By harnessing our own technical resources, The Smallpeice Trust’s experience of running residential courses schools, and the expertise of the Royal Academy of Engineering who helped develop the week, we believe we are setting new standards in the provision of work-based learning for schools students.”

Claire Fisher, Marketing Officer for The Smallpeice Trust commented “Thanks to the generous support from National Grid, we were able to give students a unique chance to explore an exiting and evolving career. We hope this opportunity will encourage students to go on to consider playing a part in tackling climate change and energy supply issues in the future.”

The National Grid Work Experience Week is run by National Grid in partnership with the independent charity, The Smallpeice Trust, and is part of an ongoing programme of residential courses to help young people aged 13 to 18 learn and develop skills in engineering, design, technology and manufacturing. Through running residential courses and STEM enrichment days, The Trust has reached out to 15,630 students across the UK in the past year.

The new course timetable for 2011 will be launched in September. Places are allocated on a first come, first served basis. To find out more, visit www.smallpeicetrust.org.uk, or telephone The Smallpeice Trust on 01926 333200.

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Notes to editors

About The Smallpeice Trust:

The Smallpeice Trust is an independent charitable trust which promotes engineering as a career, primarily through the provision of residential courses for young people aged 13 to 18.

The Smallpeice Trust was founded in 1966 by Dr Cosby Smallpeice, a pioneering engineer and inventor of the Smallpeice Lathe. Following the stock market flotation of his company Martonair, Dr Smallpeice invested his energy and part of his personal fortune to set up the Trust to ensure that British industry could continuously benefit from his proven design and engineering philosophies: “Simplicity in design, economy in production.”

The Trust is now governed by an eminent board of non-executive trustees and members from a diverse range of engineering, industry, educational and professional bodies. Over the past year, The Smallpeice Trust has reached out to around 16,000 young people through 32 different subsidised 4-day residential courses and 1-day in-school curriculum enrichment masterclasses.

For more information, visit www.smallpeicetrust.org.uk.

About National Grid:

National Grid is an international electricity and gas company and one of the largest investor-owned energy companies in the world.

National Grid owns the high-voltage electricity transmission network in England and Wales and operates the system across Great Britain. It also owns and operates the high pressure gas transmission system in Britain and its distribution business delivers gas to 11 million homes and businesses. National Grid also has a number of related businesses such as LNG importation and storage, land remediation and metering.