I’ve wanted to write about post-pandemic education for some time now, and then I saw Earth Day 2021 was coming up and thought I should write about Earth Day too. Then, when I started reading about Earth Day’s origins, I realised I could write a piece about both themes because they are intrinsically linked.
Easter is a busy time for us – it’s a time where we are guiding the students on the current programme cycle towards submitting their Big Ideas into the competition while simultaneously launching our school recruitment for next year’s Big Ideas Programme 2022 and reaching out to schools between now and the summer holidays.
Every Monday morning we have a team meeting on Teams – we’re a tiny-but-mighty organisation with 4 core team members, and we work remotely, so we’ve been having video meetings long before COVID19 dictated the ‘new norm’. Each of us takes a turn at chairing the meeting, and part of that role is to do a 15-minute ‘introduction’. This is an opportunity to share something with the team for interest, amusement, action or reflection, and is a great way to kick-start our week.
Our first ever Virtual Big Ideas Competition 2020 is drawing to a close – 645 pieces of work were submitted; over 150 students from over 20 schools continued through the lockdown; more than 60 incredible mentors and judges were involved; and 7 live online regional finals were held! As an organization we are so pleased to have created a space, albeit virtual, for such incredible hope, positivity, collaboration and action at such a difficult time for the world. The S4TP team reflect on the last few months below, whilst looking forward to celebrating ALL the teams involved at the live-streamed ‘A Night With Big Ideas’ event on Thursday, August 6th, 17:30 – 19:00: Continue reading
Today is World Mental Health Day, and, as we face a daily onslaught of uncertainty and negative news stories, it’s a useful opportunity to reflect and re-calibrate.
