A group of ten employees from Stanlow inspired young minds at the recent Essar STEAM festival, which was held at the National Boat Museum in Ellesmere Port. Essar has supported the festival since it was established six years ago, as both headline sponsor and delivering workshops at the event.
The five day festival is organised by the Ignite Teaching School Alliance, working with a group of local primary schools in a mission to bring STEM subjects to life through interactive and fun workshops. The sessions also include art based activities - the A in STEAM.
The festival saw 2,000 eight to eleven year olds get hands on with activities designed to engage minds across subjects in science, technology, engineering, arts and maths. Over a dozen different organisations took part in the event, providing a rich mix of subjects delivered through practical and fun workshops for the year five and six children present.
The Essar workshop focused on the topic of separation, and included activities that demonstrated filtration – cleaning dirty water through a variety of different types of filter materials - as well as a board that outlined the distillation process at Stanlow, and how it leads to the manufacture of different products for our customers.
These simple, yet effective activities proved popular with the children and teachers, and the exercise was a great opportunity for Essar employees to engage with local communities, explain the science involved, and inspire future generations.