The low uptake of STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths) has been hot on the sectors\u2019 agenda and a number of government and industry backed campaigns have been launched to help nurture the talent pipeline.<\/p>\n
Now it seems that a valuable boost to these efforts has come from a more unlikely source \u2013 the world of TV sitcoms.<\/p>\n
Popular TV shows such as the Gadget Show and The Big Bang theory have made the complexities of STEM subjects more digestible to a wider audience.<\/p>\n
The findings from a survey conducted by Mondelez International, a leading multi-national firm, also revealed that more than a third (37%) of the 1,500 14-18 year olds questioned has also considered taking STEM subjects after watching shows fronted by physicist Brian Cox.<\/p>\n
This idea is also supported by findings from Manchester University, who outlined that a rise in applications for physics could be linked to the fact that Prof Cox teaches Quantum Physics and Relativity to first year students.<\/p>\n
Despite these positive figures, the Mondelez survey found that misconceptions about STEM are preventing some students from considering a career in the STEM sectors.<\/p>\n
Revealing some of the reasons they avoid STEM subjects; more than half (53%) of young people surveyed argued that they felt STEM was \u201charder\u201d than humanities, while more than two-thirds felt that only those with a high IQs could succeed in STEM careers.<\/p>\n
Further figures showed that boys (64%) were more likely than girls (49%) to be deterred from choosing STEM subjects and STEM jobs.<\/p>\n
The study comes as George Osborne, the Chancellor, and Elizabeth Truss, the Education Minister, reveal proposals for private businesses to partly fund teachers in state school.<\/p>\n
Part of this plan includes sponsors such as Goldman Sachs, RBS, Barclays and BAE systems providing \u00a375,000 over a three year period to graduates with PhDs in maths or physics. This will allow them to train and work in schools.<\/p>\n
Commenting, Mrs Truss said:<\/p>\n
“Too many teenagers think maths and physics are niche subjects; that couldn’t be further from the truth.<\/p>\n
“They open the door to careers in everything from business or journalism to technology or engineering.<\/p>\n
“We want to inspire young people to study maths and physics and I can\u2019t think of anyone better to do that than teachers.\u201d<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The low uptake of STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths) has been hot on the sectors\u2019 agenda and a number of government and industry backed campaigns have been launched to help nurture the talent pipeline. Now it seems that a valuable boost to these efforts has come from a more unlikely source \u2013 the world […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":692,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_breakdance_hide_in_design_set":false,"_breakdance_tags":"","footnotes":"","_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-34304","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-graduate-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/discovery-adr.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34304","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/discovery-adr.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/discovery-adr.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/discovery-adr.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/discovery-adr.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34304"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/discovery-adr.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34304\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/discovery-adr.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/692"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/discovery-adr.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34304"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/discovery-adr.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34304"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/discovery-adr.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34304"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}