STEM Education

At Discovery Park, we don’t just work to make today a success, we’re always looking to tomorrow. STEM education is a vital part of what we do, sparking a love of science to last a lifetime.

This is a science park built on collaboration, with young scientists benefiting from unrivalled access to companies carrying out innovative and pioneering research in laboratories on site – from immuno-oncology and diagnostics to new forms of antibiotics.

For example, PhD students working out of Canterbury Christ Church University’s (CCCU) Life Sciences Industry Liaison Laboratory, launched on site in 2016 have been supporting tenants Genea Biomedx and Venomtech in exploring a variety of potential new treatments and processes.

From the colourful Big Bang and East Kent Science Jamboree school events to the Community Lab, a partnership between Discovery Park, Pfizer, CCCU and STEM Learning , Discovery Park supports events for all stages of learning. Add in apprenticeships, we’re not simply raising awareness, but creating an environment for training, ambition and job creation.

Discovery Park is ensuring the skills and expertise built up on this site over decades as a science hub continue to grow for generations to come, a talent pool that pharma and biotech companies located here are able to access.

Community Lab

Community Lab is a collaboration between Canterbury Christ Church University, Discovery Park, Pfizer, STEM Learning and a number of other tenants on site.

It provides schools in Kent with access to an industrial standard laboratory and equipment that would not traditionally be available. Local schools are free to come in and carry out experiments, supported by real scientists that work on site. The lab will also function as a learning environment for teachers and technicians, providing practical  CPD opportunities.

Community Lab provides an opportunity for the industrial scientific community at Discovery Park to pass on skills and knowledge to inspire the scientists of tomorrow. You can read about the effect the Community Lab is having on local students and schools in our January 2020 Impact Report here.

Find out more about the Discovery Park Community Lab project.  If you are interested in supporting Community Lab or are a school interested in booking time for the facility, please get in touch using our contact form.

Schools invited to shine with launch of Bright Sparks Awards

The Bright Spark Awards are staged to help make science cool. Students are encouraged to collaborate using cross-curricular skills in maths, IT, science and engineering to innovate and create.

Competition categories are: Innovation, Investigation, and Invention.

• There are no age restrictions so both primary and secondary schools can get involved.
• There is no limit to the number of entries a school or even a group of students can submit, but each entry will be judged separately.

Finalists will be invited to the annual awards event, which is run in a dragons’ den-style format. The students will be filmed in advance in school to show the detail of the project. This is screened before the students take to the stage to describe their creation and dragons quiz the youngsters on their initiative. Different panels of dragons will judge the varying categories or year groups and award trophies and experience prizes to the students and schools.

Overall Bright Spark Awards champions  win a top prize of £500.

Nominations for the Bright Spark Awards must be received by noon on Friday 31 May 2019

For more information on the awards, please follow this link: http://www.kmcharityteam.co.uk/schools/brightspark/

You Tuber Greg Foot wows Big Bang 2018

You Tuber and TV science presenter Greg Foot joined more than 1,000 secondary pupils from schools across Kent swapped the classroom for a day of interactive fun at Discovery Park

The Big Bang, organised by The STEM Hub, brings companies and educators together with one common purpose: to spark a passion for science, technology, engineering and maths. From medicine making – with balloons as replica molecules – to making waves with Maths (and a water tank) there was plenty going on to fire the imagination and to get across how important STEM subjects are to modern life.

Find out more in our news section.

East Kent Science Jamboree

Discovery Park hosted the annual East Kent Science Jamboree for the fifth year running in June 2017, bringing together science companies and engineers with a single aim – to inspire the next generation of scientists.

This ever popular and inspirational educational science event brought 1,500 children aged 10-11 together from over 50 Kent primary schools from across Thanet and Dover districts.

The Year 6 youngsters took part in hands on science experiments designed to spark a love of science subjects and complement their classroom teaching experience by bringing science to life.

Find out more in our news section.

Collaboration in action

The School of Human and Life Sciences at Canterbury Christ Church University (CCCU) opened its industry liaison laboratory at Discovery Park in March 2016.

The industry liaison laboratory provides the University and its students with first class facilities for science and research, with access to a diverse and dynamic range of pharmaceutical and bio-technology companies.

PhD have linked initially with Genea Biomedx and Venomtech on specific research projects connected to research being carried out at Discovery Park. They presented their initial findings at a symposium event earlier this year.

Find out more about CCCU’s Industry Liaison Laboratory.