Community Outreach at NETPark, County Durham.
In 2009, the University of Durham and County Durham Development Company secured a grant from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) for the Project C (Innovation Connector) Project. Since then, we have worked with over 15,000 people to deliver science and technology activities and events, helping people of all ages to get stuck into science.
Brainwave@NETPark is a free annual summer science festival featuring kids science workshops, family activities, science shows and dazzling displays of technology. Held at NETPark (the North East Technology Park) in Sedgefield in 2010 and 2011, hundreds of families and schoolchildren from County Durham and the North East got stuck into science.
The community events we run are designed to make science and technology as interesting, inviting and inspiring as possible and Brainwave really is all of those things. In 2012 we took Brainwave on the road around County Durham.
The Science Museum London came to Bishop Auckland Town Hall in January (their first ever visit to the North East) running kids science activities and workshops, showcasing everything from the science behind bubbles to demonstrations of how to make instant ice cream.
Further family events during the February half term holidays included solar powered car displays and the chance to build geodesic domes, large spherical structures similar to those at the Eden Project in Cornwall and the Epcot Centre in Disneyland in Florida.
At NETPark and in County Durham we have a large number of innovative technology businesses. We know we're World Leaders in science (hey, NASA come to visit US!) and it's really important that we encourage the next generation to consider science as a future career, offering them interesting and exciting opportunities right here in the North East.
The Project C Project is part financed by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), managed by the Department for Communities and Local Government, securing £0.49m ERDF investment. The ERDF Competitiveness Programme 2007-13 is bringing over £300m into the North East to support innovation, enterprise and business support across the region.
