THE INTERVIEW MAY 2019
PRIMING THE FUTURE
With a skills shortage looming over the
industry, a new approach is needed in
order to ensure the next generation is
considering a career in manufacturing
BY CHRIS BECK
A sk any manufacturer what the biggest
threat facing the industry is and
you’ll get a range of answers, from
Brexit to automation and difficulties
in sourcing finance. However, there
is one threat that makes all the rest
pale into insignificance. The skills shortage is
threatening to cripple the long-term future of the
manufacturing industry. The British Chamber of
Commerce warned at the start of this year that
the sector is facing its greatest skills shortage in
30 years, which the Open University estimates
will cost as much as £2bn per year.
Leading the charge against the looming crisis is
Susan Scurlock, founder of Primary Engineer and
Secondary Engineer, who this month launched the
Institutions of Primary Engineers and Secondary
Engineers at the House of Lords. Both Primary
Engineer and Secondary Engineer aim to bring
industry into the classroom, giving pupils a firsthand
view of how engineers and manufacturers
operate. Manufacturing Management sat down with
Susan, who was awarded an MBE in the Queen’s
New Year’s honours this year, to find out more
about the work she is doing in promoting the
industry to the next generation.
MM: What is the story behind the
formation of Primary Engineer?
SS: As a secondary school teacher, I saw a lot of
kids who had already given up. I think it’s criminal
that children can be in school for as long as they
are and not feel that they can go out and get a good
career at the end of it. When I was teaching, we
lost a lot of kids that had literally just given up and
didn’t see the point. At the time, I thought that if
you could get kids designing things and making
them, and linking that with local engineering firms
to provide context, it would change the way that
kids engage with STEM (Science, Technology,
Engineering and Maths) education, and the way
that teachers engage with industry. In 2005, I
applied for a fund from the Department of Trade
and Industry and was lucky enough to receive three
years of funding to set up what is now Primary
Engineer. I then had to give everything up to go and
do that. It involved taking a bit of a deep breath, but
if I hadn’t done it then I wouldn’t be where I am
now. The rest, as they say, is history.
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MM: Do teachers focus
enough on STEM subjects
and appreciate their value?
SS: Schools are very much tied
to what they have to deliver in
terms of educational outcomes.
They are also very limited by the
number of teachers available to
teach the necessary subjects.
We originally focussed on
primary education: primary
teachers, by and large, have no
industrial background. They
don’t know what industry
looks like. Teacher training is
all focussed around classroom
management; there isn’t a place
for STEM to naturally fit in. The
metrics of the system dictate the
outcomes, and at the moment
the metrics don’t allow for a lot
of help when it comes to STEM
skills. The training we provide
through Primary Engineer tries
to contextualise learning and
provide a method of projectbased
learning so teachers can
apply skills in the right places.
We’ve found that it works
brilliantly with primary schools,
but less well in secondaries,
where subjects are taught in silos
and any crossover of learning is
harder to implement. Teachers
have to constantly find ways to
circumvent the system to
ensure that teachers are able
to teach things that the kids will
do more with.
MM: How has this style of
teaching been received?
SS: Last year we worked with
3,500 teachers. One of our top
metrics is whether someone
would recommend us to
someone else, and we have a
99% hit rate on that. Teachers
see the value of it, it’s just down
to the bandwidth within the
system for them to be able to
apply it. One of the strategies
we’ve used is to come up with a
number of different projects, to
avoid teachers having to repeat
what they teach from one lesson
to the next. We want to stress
that engineering comes in many
different forms – it’s a diverse
industry, with loads of different
jobs that people can do.
MM: Has industry itself
seen the benefit?
SS: On the whole, industry
has been outstanding. The
projects we’ve designed have
been done to provide engineers
with flexibility based on their
availability. If they only have
Susan Scurlock is
a former teacher
on a crusade to
demonstrate the
power of industry
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