Looking forward As we reflect on our achievements in the last academic year it naturally raises the question of the future. With recent changes to the team including my own appointment as Managing Director in September and a new Fundraising Manager, Amanda Croft-Pearman, and the imminent announcement of new trustees joining the board we are looking forward positively to 2020. Developing on the success of our construction tutors we welcome our new STEM tutor, Carl Webb, to the team to provide flexibility and in-house expertise. Carl has a degree in Construction and worked in industry before becoming a Technology teacher for the last 14 years. This recognises our ongoing need to focus on the continual improvement of our STEM programmes and brings flexibility to our delivery in this area. In September we started our second Erasmus+ project: Cyber Adventure. A project aimed at creating an educational tool to support teachers with the online safety education of primary school children. The project is led by Aston University and involves partners from Spain, Lithuania and Portugal. We are also working with our current STEM Associates to offer new programmes. This includes programmes for both Post 16 and Primary school students. Whilst we are looking at expanding our impact on the careers programmes in Secondary schools by offering a ‘Challenging Perceptions’ stand to school careers fairs using our extensive network to provide a greater understanding of the vast array of training, study and work opportunities in STEM. We continue to work closely with corporate partners to expand our impact. In the autumn we announced a joint venture initiative with COINS and Beard Construction to support the delivery of our Mobile Construction Classroom. Indeed, our Mobile Construction delivery continues to be particularly successful with both schools and funders. Our team of six tutors provide a unique programme which has immediate impact. We have recently taken delivery of a new van, funded by the Thames Valley LEP, and are currently seeking both new schools, corporate partners and potentially a new tutor if demand exceeds current capacity. We are starting to implement some of the key values of the UN Sustainability Goals across our programmes. This is best reflected in our new primary cross-school challenge – Energy Monitoring. This brings together corporate partners (Powercor, Signify and TR Control Solutions) to offer state school students the opportunity to monitor in real-time their electrical energy use in school with the challenge to reduce their carbon footprint. This new academic year has started with some exciting initiatives which will no doubt make 2019-20 an even more successful year for SATRO. Anne Edward, SATRO Managing Director
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