Creative Hut partners with official charities of Preston North End, Blackburn Rovers and Bolton Wanderers to deliver STEM United programme
1,300+ Students Reached
3 x Six week curriculum module
3 Football Club Charities United
Football Club Charities Unite to Inspire Future STEM Talent
Three North West football clubs’ charities have joined forces to deliver hands-on robotics and coding sessions for primary school pupils across some of the region’s most deprived communities.
The STEM United programme is being delivered by the community trusts of Preston North End, Blackburn Rovers and Bolton Wanderers, with more than £80,000 awarded through a community fund of more than half a million pounds set up from donations from the EFL, its charitable arm EFL in the Community, and the FA.
Through this funding, we’re focused on backing ideas that can be tested locally and then scaled nationally - and this is a brilliant example of that in action.
— Mark WelshHead of Income Generation and Innovation | EFL in the Community
Led by Preston North End Community and Education Trust, and delivered in partnership with Creative Hut and fellow North West Football Club charities, this pilot has shown how a football-themed approach can bring STEM and coding to life in a way that feels relevant, accessible and engaging for young people. It’s helping to build digital confidence, creativity and problem-solving skills, while creating a model with real potential to scale across our wider network.
Reaching 1,300 Young People Across the North West
Across the three-club consortium, the programme will work with 45 Key Stage 2 classes, including Year 5 and Year 6, in their local communities this academic year. It will reach over 1,300 pupils through a series of six-week interventions designed to build confidence, skills and interest in science, technology, engineering and maths.
The scheme was developed with STEM education provider Creative Hut, which supplied equipment, training and programme design to enable delivery in schools. Creative Hut developed three football-themed learning pathways and equipped staff from each club to deliver them.
This kind of support is urgently needed in Lancashire, where challenges around educational outcomes, deprivation and digital exclusion remain despite strong links to STEM industries.
— Jake BlackburnHead of Schools | Preston North End Community and Education Trust
By working closely with local partners, we identified STEM as a clear priority. This programme gives young people access to experiences they might not otherwise have, while helping schools deliver more engaging, meaningful learning.
Bringing STEM to Life Through Football-Inspired Challenges
Using football as an engaging route into learning, pupils take part in hands-on coding and robotics sessions, programming devices to complete challenges and solve real-world problems. Sessions use technologies including LEGO® Education SPIKE™ Prime, Ozobot and Sphero BOLT+ – programmable robotics tools allowing pupils to learn coding by controlling movement and solving challenges.
Activities are designed to link directly to curriculum outcomes while helping children develop coding, engineering, sequencing and problem-solving skills.
Joe Conway, Project Officer at Bolton Wanderers in the Community, added: “Using football as a starting point helps us connect with young people straight away. From there, we can introduce coding, robotics and problem-solving in a way that feels fun, interactive and something they want to be part of.”
In many of the communities we work in, access to this kind of technology simply isn’t there. Being able to bring STEM into schools in a way that is engaging and relevant is incredibly important, and the response from both pupils and teachers so far has been really positive.
— Jennifer CalvertHead of Children and Young People Services | Blackburn Rovers Community Trust
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