I know I’m not alone in thinking that STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths) is going to be the key to answering many of the challenges that the world and society face now and into the future.

I have some experience of education - in part through being a governor at a local primary school but more so through parenting three children. One thing that I have observed is that children are forced to do their maths and science at school and yet see few examples of where these skills will become relevant in the real world (aside from perhaps becoming a maths teacher!).

Our lighting design studio 18 Degrees is based at Here East in East London. One of the things that is great about Here East is the diversity of institutions that are based here - from small companies such as ours through to larger firms, broadcasters, arts institutions and educators. The thing that we all have in common is a connection to STEM in one way or another.

Last week I had the opportunity to bring 90 children from Rhodes Avenue Primary School to Here East to show them some STEM in action. We saw robots, funky architectural models and the lighting lab with an artificial sky at UCL. We had the kids wearing Oculus Rift VR headsets, we saw industrial scale 3D printing at Hobs Repro. In Plexal we were inspired by a talk from Grimshaw about the art and science of #architecture. The underlying message in all of this is that maths and science should not be seen as those lessons that you’re made to do whether you like it or not; but the gateway to a career doing something really cool, hanging out with interesting people in a hotbed of innovation and creativity such as what we have here at Plexal and Here East.

Feedback from the children: “I definitely want to do STEM when I leave school”. From one of the mums who came along to help on the day “I wonder if it’s too late to retrain as an architect?”.

Special thanks to those who made this day possible: Andrew Roughan Henry Turner Steven Kennedy Peter Raynham Edward Barrett Denis Delaney.