Last Friday (26th January 2018), students on our year 8 ‘Ambitions’ programme travelled to the University of Nottingham’s Sutton Bonnington campus. The aim of the day was to consider future careers choices and GCSE options, focusing on raising aspiration and encouraging students who may aim to go to university in the future.
The day began with students completing a personality quiz to determine their strengths, the type of person they are and some suggested careers that suit their personality type. The quiz was surprisingly accurate with many students already considering the careers that the results suggested would suit them.
The QEA group went on to play a fun game with students from other academies and schools, focused on employment and job types. This involved trying to guess the hidden job (which was on a Post-It note attached to their forehead!) by asking key questions, giving students the chance to think about requirements of certain roles and what the jobs involved.
Students were then treated to a fascinating lecture about ‘What can you do that Artificial Intelligence can’t?’ by Dr Peter Watts. The lecture led into an interesting discussion between Dr Watts and the students, debating what it meant to be human and whether it was possible or not for a machine to be human. The discussion delved into deep philosophical and ethical questions, with our students asking a range of mature and intelligent questions and providing thoughtful answers.
In the afternoon, students were given a tour of the beautiful campus by the university student ambassadors, including halls of residence, the sports centre and many non-academic areas of the campus – this gave the Queen Elizabeth’s students a valuable insight into what being at university entails.
Well done to all of the students for your engagement and behaviour on the visit – staff members Mrs Hill and Miss Neale were impressed with your maturity, and we hope that it has inspired some young minds to focus on university and employment options for their future.
