The Physics Mentoring Project is currently recruiting schools to take part this Spring Term (Cycle 8)!

The Physics Mentoring Project places trained students from Welsh universities into schools across Wales to mentor students in year 9-11 in the subject of Physics.

Previous evaluation reports have shown that participation in Physics Mentoring leads to an increase in the numbers of school students intending to take Physics A-level and go into STEM-related careers, including for girls, who are broadly underrepresented in Physics A-level classrooms. In fact, the project leads to an improvement in all participants’ impressions of physics, regardless of whether they go on to choose the subject. Teachers and mentees have also reported an increase in the mentees’ confidence, which develops as they discover how relevant physics is to them.

Alongside In-person mentoring and virtual mentoring, cycle 8 of Physics Mentoring is the launch of Blended Mentoring. This is available for schools up to 60 minutes away from a participating university and takes the following format.

  • Two trained mentors are paired with a secondary school,
  • Schools select a small group of year 9-11 pupils to take part as mentees,
  • Mentors conduct session one and six in-person
  • Mentors conduct four online sessions with the mentees in a live-streaming style which are 45 – 60min in length, 
  • Teacher (group owner), mentor and mentee are in a group on Teams or Google Classroom where they can communicate (never 1:1) during specified mentoring session times for conversations around video content/mentor journey/topics for discussion,
  • Webinar sessions are broadcast by mentors to mentees and teacher/supervisor during which mentees are able to interact with the mentor via public chat messages which are monitored by staff.
  • Each mentoring cycle ends with an Award and Recognition ceremony.

You can find out more about the impact of the online format on participating schools and mentees in this video, blog post or case study.

Places are limited, so if you are interested in running the project in your school, please contact physicsmentoring@cardiff.ac.uk as soon as possible.

We look forward to hearing from you!

Best wishes,

Celina