Stardust Hunters

This project aims to:

- Engage and enthuse school pupils aged 8-14 years about the exciting and relatively new research area of urban micrometeorites.
- Deliver high quality educational activities based around this topic, highlighting this area of STFC research to schools and public audiences in the South and West Wales areas
- Target schools in under-served communities in socioeconomically deprived areas of South and West Wales, providing them with the opportunity to carry out scientific investigations in school (and at home with their parents/families/guardians) which can then genuinely contribute to real research.
- Provide pupils with the skills needed to 'work like a scientist' by developing their investigative skills,
- Introduce pupils to enthusiastic STEM communicators/scientists who will convey their career journey to them, showcasing the possible routes that pupils can take if they wish to pursue a career in STEM.

This pilot project will target both English and Welsh medium primary and secondary schools in South Wales, ensuring that speakers of both languages in Wales have access to these innovative and engaging resources.

The impact on the pupils will be increased knowledge of this area of STFC research, and the topic of the Solar System in general; increased knowledge, skills and confidence in developing and carrying out a scientific investigation (how a scientists works); increased engagement of the community in science in general, and increased opportunity for school pupils to participate in real research tasks with the possibility of being the first to find micrometeorites in Wales (possibly the UK) and contributing to research papers. Learning the skills of how to search for and identify potential micrometeorites through the workshops, pupils will also be able to take this knowledge home to their families and continue to carry out these investigations at home, with other family members or friends. All resources will be available on the project website, thus their family and friends can find out more about the science etc. behind the project this way. This 'citizen science' approach will have an impact on the family/friends of the pupils who have attended a workshop, thus dispersing the project further and encouraging more people to engage in science.

The schools workshops, along with bilingual curriculum-linked documents will cover a number of areas. Pupils will learn about Solar System Science and the topic of micrometeorites in general, including STFC's contribution to this research area. They will then learn and develop their skills on how to carry out a scientific investigation, with the main aim being for them to conduct their own search for micrometeorites in their school playgrounds. They will learn how to identify candidate micrometeorites and then have any potential candidates analysed by the team in Swansea University for confirmation on whether they have found a micrometeorite or not. Older students (11-14 years) will also be given information and educational resources based on the analysis methods used at the University (e.g. how scanning electron microscopes work, what is a spectrum and what does it tell us etc).

The impact on STFC will be through an increase in awareness of STFC and its research.

This is a pilot project, which if successful, we would like to roll out to schools outside of Wales (depending on funding). However, the resources which will be developed as part of this pilot project will be freely available for the duration of the project and beyond, for anyone to access and use, giving the opportunity for anyone to engage in this area of science in their own homes and communities.

The workshops will be mainly delivered in both primary & secondary schools by AstroCymru, Oriel Science and the NBGW, although it is envisaged that project staff may also do some ad-hoc workshops as requested by schools.
- Astrocymru will deliver 10 workshops in schools across the duration of this project. These 3 hour workshops will reach ~300 pupils and ~10 teachers.
- NBGW will deliver 10 workshops in schools across the duration of this project. These 3 hour workshops will reach ~300 pupils and ~10 teachers.
- Oriel Science will deliver 1-hour pre-booked and drop-in workshops in their school holiday events programme across the duration of this project. Estimating 50 people per day, and running 10 days of events, this will reach ~500 family participants.

Website and resources:
- A website will be developed containing the background science and introduction to the project, along with classroom resources/documents for running a stardust hunting workshop. There will be a space on the website for schools to upload their images of potential micrometeorites for analysis by Swansea University staff, with the aim of then confirming that the object needs further analysis, or is a terrestrial object so needs no further analysis. Schools will also be able to write up short articles about their investigations for others to read. These will be published on the website, but we will also work with them to publish their results in schools-based journals such as the 'Science in Schools' publication and 'School Science review' journal.
- The resources and instructions will be available (in Welsh and English) on the website for anyone to access

Flyers: Flyers will be produced for the project with information about the website and instructions on how people can find their own MMs with everyday equipment. This will enable the participants of this project to carry on with the project after either the toolkits have been returned (from schools) or after the workshop activities have finished (at Oriel Science).

The flyers will be available:
- For family participants of the Oriel Science events.
- At all schools visited
- At public events (so that schools or families can carry out their own investigations)

Journals
- We will write up this pilot project for educational journals as an example of school pupils/families doing science investigations and real research. Depending on findings (i.e. if we find some MMs), we will also write up any scientific results in suitable journals.
- As mentioned above, we will work with participating schools to encourage them to write up their work, both for the project website but also for publication in educational journals such as 'School Science Review' and 'Science in Schools'.

Talks
- We will deliver conference talks where applicable (e.g. IOP Wales events, National Astronomy Meeting, European Geosciences Union events, STFC PE events etc.) to disseminate the project and 'best practice' to both the research and educational communities.

Public events:
- As mentioned earlier in this application, we will attend at least 8 public events during the project (e.g. Swansea Science Festival, Eisteddfodau, Oriel Science Super Saturday, National Botanic Gardens of Wales Space Day etc.) showcasing the project and demo-ing the techniques needed to go stardust hunting. These events will also be an opportunity to showcase this area of STFC research and highlight the work done by STFC and STFC researchers. These events have very high attendance figures (e.g. the Science tent at the National Eisteddfod of Wales in 2018 attracted over 30,000 visitors over the course of a week; Swansea Science Festiavl attracted 2000 people in Nov 2018 and Oriel Science's Super Science Sunday event at the National Waterfront Museum in March 2019 attracted 3588 visitors in 1 day). We estimate reaching at least 23588 members of the public.