Teachers
Orbyts partners science researchers with students in local state schools to empower young people to undertake cutting-edge research. Our goal is to improve inclusivity in science for historically excluded groups whilst supporting teachers who do not otherwise have the time or resources to run extra-curriculum projects.
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If you would like to get involved in Orbyts, or just want to find out more, then we’d love to hear from you. Please get in touch with us here: info@orbyts.org
Our partner teachers say:
"As for how useful I've found the project - in a tough year with significant professional challenges to overcome, this has been a real "get me out of bed in the morning" kind of project. The project has fed back down through the school with Orbyts members giving presentations to lower year groups and it's even changed my teaching to my 13 year old students - all my magnetism stuff is now fed through the lens of the importance of our magnetic field and what the aurora on Earth tell us about the conditions necessary for life here. Multiple other staff have become involved and have had valuable subject knowledge gains and through the school publications the wider school community - parents etc have also become enthused and are talking with their children about the project even if they're not directly involved. Orbyts is definitely one of the coolest things I've been exposed to in my 15 year career."
-D. Fleming (Chemistry Teacher)
"It is clear to me that the Orbyts project has been the most successful project that we have been fortunate enough to work with and its importance cannot be overstated."
-W. Whyatt (Physics Teacher)
"Key to the success of Orbyts has been its mentorship aspect. Other laudable initiatives...do not assign mentors and count on school teachers to conduct such activities themselves – this would simply not have been possible given the time commitment and skills involved. "EVERY student who took Orbyts... decided to take Physics at sixth form - a tremendous show of the programme’s success. Another aspect worth mentioning is what excellent material the Orbyts experience provides for the students’ personal statements when writing up their university applications – it makes them really stand out. We only have “Orbyts alumnae” doing university-level STEM subjects after September 2020."
-J. Barroca (Physics Teacher)
"Meeting the PhD students and course coordinators reconnected me with the excitement of studying science at university level and reminded me what science education can be about. Given the very high rate of loss of science teachers from the profession, having such opportunities for re-energising teachers can be very important for recruitment and retention of teaching staff.
I would have no hesitation in endorsing the Orbyts project, which I think has been of great benefit to my students, and in recommending it to other schools."
-S. Clark (Science Teacher)
"Orbyts is an integral part of our extra-curricular offerings to A level physics and Chemistry students at Highams Park School. The opportunity to work with PhD and post-doc researchers is absolute gold dust to the students and they show their appreciation through their professionalism and dedication to the project. To have students as named authors on a published paper from the first year of the ORBYTS program was a great honour to them as well as the school and we hope to see several more papers published in due course. The ORBYTS mentors are unfailingly helpful and cheerful, patiently explaining the details of quantum astrophysics at a level that Year 12 students can grasp. More important than this stretching of understanding and even the glimpse of life as a researcher are the skills the students develop such as teamwork, resilience, organisation and not being afraid of asking questions!"
- J. Barker, (Physics Teacher)