Hutt Science success recognised with Government funding

HUTT CITY COUNCIL NEWS RELEASE

23 FEBRUARY 2017

Hutt Science success recognised with Government funding

The success and great potential of Hutt Science’s after school activities and hands-on science in schools has been recognised with nearly $60,000 in funding from the government’s Unlocking Curious Minds fund.

It’s a tremendous achievement, thanks largely to the work of Anne Ryan who organises and promotes Hutt City Council’s Hutt Science programme.

With Lower Hutt becoming a vibrant science and technology hub, Anne’s says her mission is “to make our kids part of that future.”

The House of Science, based in Tauranga, devises special science kits and a band of volunteers help Anne to distribute them to local schools to use in their daily learning.

Anne explains, “Teachers use the kits as a base of learning for the next few weeks. The focus is on making sense of science: how you question, how you think about things. The learning also expands out from the kits into measuring, mathematics, discussions and creative writing projects.”

While the kits are powerful learning tools, they’re also a lot of fun for students and a perk of Anne’s job is seeing the kids’ excitement. “Science is often perceived as boring, so we’ve got to turn that around.”

Favourites include rocket-building kits, the brand new ‘May the Force Be With You’ physics kit featuring cars, ramps and balancing shapes and ‘WelTec Bee-Bots’, which introduces very young kids to robots and coding.

“It’s an amazing community resource,” says Anne who often takes the kits out to family events like Te Ra o Te Raukura.

Learn more at huttscience.co.nz

ENDS

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