Native Scientist Workshops: Call For Teachers Is Now Open

Our Native Schools Programme is now open for submissions! We invite language or science teachers to register their interest in hosting a workshop with international scientists. To do so, please go here.

Requests will be analysed by the Native Scientist team and according to availability of resources and volunteer scientists, teachers will receive feedback about their submission within 10 days.

Fees of £60/60€ (member schools) or £150/150€ (non-member schools) per workshop may apply.

What is a Native Scientist Workshop?

Native Scientist Workshops are the science and language workshops that we organise under the Native Schools Programme. Our workshops bring together 4-5 scientists and 20-25 pupils to talk and try science in a different language - usually the language they speak at home with their families.

Each workshop lasts approximately 1.5-hours and enables pupils to connect with role models and learn language through science or science through language.

The workshops are specially designed to target pupils who speak a different language at home and in school. They help pupils realise their full potential while developing their language skills and science knowledge. They are a great opportunity to meet role models, raise aspirations and reinforce a positive attitude towards science and towards the heritage language.

Native Scientist is a non-profit organisation that connects immigrant pupils and scientists to tackle educational disadvantage and promote science and language literacy. Since its foundation in 2013, 60+ workshops have been organised, reaching over 1700 pupils.

Why requesting a workshop?

“Our students thoroughly enjoyed the Native Scientist workshop, including those who can be a bit reluctant to learn. I was very impressed with the design of the workshop, as well as the skills of the scientists in engaging our students in their research” says a teacher from a school in London.

In Europe, foreign-born pupils are twice as likely to underachieve in science or maths and to drop-out school at an early stage than native-born pupils. When arriving to a host country, foreign-born pupils need to overcome multiple barriers, including socio-economic status, language difficulties, cultural differences and issues of prejudice and perception towards their country of origin.

To help immigrant pupils integrate in the host country and to enable them to reach their full potential, our workshops are innovative, cross-curricular workshops that promote science and language learning and connect pupils to successful scientists who share a common heritage. This helps pupils feel that becoming a scientist is a real viable option (3 in 4 pupils feel inspired to become a scientist after a workshop) and that speaking more than one language is an asset (all pupils feel prouder of speaking more than one language after a workshop).

Where do we organise workshops and at languages do we cover and where?

We currently operate in the UK, France and Germany.

We will consider other languages but these are the languages we currently covering: French, German, Greek, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish and Turkish.