IT lessons goes galactic for students from The Bolsover School

School IT lessons were brought to life by the world’s leading independent end-to-end IT services company for a group of students from The Bolsover School recently.

Eight Year 9 students from the school visited DXC Technology as part of the Made in Chesterfield campaign. The visit to the Chesterfield-based company was designed to show the students how they could apply their IT skills to real-life work.

As part of the visit, students learned about IT security, teamwork and coding in a real-life working environment. They even got to send a message to the International Space Station (ISS) through Mission Zero. With the support of DXC Technology, the students wrote a simple programme to display a message to the astronauts onboard, proving a big hit with the students.

Debbie Crossley, Career Information, Advice and Guidance Officer at The Bolsover School commented on the visit: “We were very fortunate in being able to take several of our Year 9 students to visit DXC Technology as part of the Made in Chesterfield campaign. The students were amazed by the type of work carried out by DXC and were fascinated by what they learnt.

“The visit offered so many learning outcomes for us around careers, apprenticeships, technology and much more. DXC Technology made us feel very welcome and the students were so pleased they went on the trip – we’ll definitely be planning another visit to this employer.”

Made in Chesterfield is aligned with the National Curriculum in order to help students and teachers access the unique leaning experiences that Made in Chesterfield will deliver throughout the year.

The campaign, which is co-ordinated by Destination Chesterfield and Derbyshire Education Business Partnership and sponsored by University of Derby, is designed to bring together businesses, schools and training providers to showcase the sector to future school leavers.

Since Made in Chesterfield was established, more than 2,500 young people from schools have spent time in the area’s manufacturing and engineering businesses. The visits to businesses operating within the STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) sector are being organised by Derbyshire Education Business Partnership.

DXC Technology is one of a number of companies from Chesterfield’s STEM sector which are opening their doors to students from across the borough in an effort to raise awareness of job opportunities.
Nicola Mills, Global Account Delivery Executive at DXC Technology explained why she thought the visits are so important: “Being a STEM Ambassador is a truly rewarding role; it creates the opportunity to work with young people like the ones from The Bolsover School at our recent Made in Chesterfield event. Events like this enable them to explore the wider world of technology that is outside of their normal day to day reach and hopefully inspires them to consider careers that they hadn’t previously.”

“As a technology company, it is vital for us to support the development of talent, the world is evolving and we are moving to a truly digital age. We can’t meet these demands without the foundations of a digital workforce; our graduate and apprentice programmes help make that achievable. We are all looking forward to a follow-up with The Bolsover School and to see the results of their Hour of Code being played on the International Space Station in May.”

Alongside the educational activity, there is also a programme of business events including a manufacturing conference, manufacturing and engineering forum, business masterclasses and networking events taking place throughout the year as part of Made in Chesterfield.

In addition to Destination Chesterfield, Derbyshire Education Business Partnership, University of Derby, Made in Chesterfield is also supported by, MSE Hiller, United Cast Bar Ltd, NatWest and Placing Futures.

To find out more about Made in Chesterfield or to arrange a school visit, please visit here.