Four of our learners were excited to have been interviewed by reporters from Sky News, who contacted LDE UTC when they wanted a story on Women in STEM, (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) for their coverage of International Women's Day on 8th March 2021.

The four, Amariah L. year 12, Nina B. year 13, Melissa G. year 13, and Blake W. year 13, were joined by ex learner Alysse, who went on to work for Sky. They shared their reasons for engaging in STEM subjects, and advised that they had been inspired by their female teachers at LDE UTC to become anything they wanted to in the field of STEM. Careers Lead, Janice Tricks, expressed great pride with how the girls presented themselves and represented the college. 

Amariah, who is planning on undertaking an apprenticeship in Architecture, said that she had been inspired by her grandfather who had been an architect, and by her teacher of architecture, Furnaz Ahmed. Nina, a biology, psychology and digital media learner in yr 13, has applied for a degree course on her path to becoming a Neuroscientist. She has been encouraged by seeing all the women involved in creating the recent vaccines against Covid-19: "I think seeing the women at the forefront, the women who are getting the vaccines out to people and the women who have been a key part of the research, it's definitely an inspiring thing," she said.

Teacher Uzma Afzal was also interviewed by Sky News. Her message was that, "Parents, education and employment sectors need to work together to encourage and motivate young girls to select and progress further in STEM. We need to eliminate the ideology that it is a masculine field and put an emphasis on the women that have been recognised for their achievements in STEM. We need our young generation of females to believe that they can do it too."

We all had a really good day and the news reporter and cameraman went away in absolute awe of what all the learners and teachers are achieving at the college despite being in lockdown.

View Sky's full coverage on their story here: Sky News - LDE UTC Girls in STEM

You can watch the news coverage by Sky News here: