Cook Medical put out call for greater access to engineering at school level

Is your child studying engineering?

When I was in secondary school engineering was a subject that was available for me to study, but I did go on to study it at college. I really enjoyed my engineering modules in college and I really wish I had had the option to take it up at school. Cook Medical recently put out a call for greater access to engineering at school level after new research showed that very few school children were studying engineering. According to new research conducted by Cook Medical among over 500 students at this year’s BT Young Scientist Exhibition, only one fifth of students surveyed study engineering at secondary school level. The research also found that a lack of access to engineering as a subject choice is the main reason that 48 per cent of students don’t study the subject, increasing to over 51 per cent for female students. These stats were released as part of Engineer’s Week 2020. Unfortunately I'm not surprised about the low take up among girls as most all female schools don't have engineering as a subject choice and often times it's assumed to be a 'boy's subject'. Even while I was studying engineering at college level there were very few women in my class but hopefully that is all beginning to change. At my son's primary school, which is mixed gendered, robotics is a subject that all children take so I know that when my daughter starts at the same school she will have the chance to build robotic creations the same as her brother. I think in this day and age with so much focused on technology it will only hinder children if they are not given access to subjects like engineering and I really hope that more schools adopt the science subject in the near future.