Institution news
Christopher Lowther CEng FIMechE has visited many schools in the Western Cape area of South Africa over the past three years. Each time he is warmly welcomed, and is delighted to engage with students and teachers about Bloodhound SSC. Chris takes on the ambassador role during his holidays, armed with his interactive presentation, balloon-car workshop materials, and Bloodhound toolbox kits supplied by the Institution.
He first visited Helderberg High School in 2016 and was invited back to talk about Bloodhound and to hold a Q&A about STEM careers with over 100 students. Michael Kershaw, a student, wrote to Chris following his visit:
“On behalf of everyone at Helderberg High School I would like to thank you for coming and sharing your project with us... It inspired me to learn more about technology and consider it as a possible career… Projects like this inspire us as students to take an interest in [maths and science] subjects. You are literally changing lives.
“Bloodhound trumps anything I’ve ever seen. It is beyond interesting, as it captures many different fields of interest into one project. I believe you are doing a great thing and I appreciate all the good you are doing for South Africans and my brothers overseas. This is clearly a big step towards employment, industrialisation and positive change.”
Chris said: “While the boys were most enthusiastic and asked a lot of questions, I sensed the girls were less so. After some persuading they asked some more philosophical questions. It turned out they had reservations about the amount of money being spent on projects such as Bloodhound when it could be spent on more worthy causes, including elimination of poverty and saving the environment.
“There followed an interesting debate in which I put forward the view that the world we live in is being continually improved – and the quality of life for people in the developing world transformed –as a result of developments in technology. These cutting-edge projects often have surprising spin-off benefits.”
He said that they discussed how engineers can help ‘save the world’. This issue had been debated before at the school and the students welcomed Chris’s perspective.
Michael added: “Our ambassador helped us step into the human side of this project and realise that it empowers people and allows them to watch their passion manifest. I love passionate people and so watching Mr Lowther speak was such a pleasure.”
His fellow student, Myles Sharp, also wrote to thank Chris, “for answering the many questions we had about the project”, adding:
“As someone who intends to study in the STEM field one day I thoroughly enjoyed the entire presentation and the Q&A session. It has inspired me to look into things like the computing of fluid dynamics, that I hadn’t known about before. Hopefully next time we see you, you will have reached the 1K!”
Chris spoke of the great value of volunteering as an ambassador: “I cannot think of anything more satisfying than experiencing the positive reaction and enthusiasm of school children of all ages when giving a presentation to schools on subjects about which engineers are so passionate. The Bloodhound project is very successful in inspiring and capturing the imagination of pupils and teachers alike.”