Curious Young Minds

From October 2021 to the present, CÚRAM SFI Research Centre for Medical Devices based at the University of Galway has been running a co-created STEAM learning programme for children aged 4-12. The young participants for whom the programme was developed are resident in Ireland through the Direct Provision system.   The central ethos of CÚRAMs Education and Public Engagement programme is to provide opportunities for learning and engaging with science learning to communities of people who are underrepresented in STEM.   Funded by Science Foundation Ireland, the yearlong project is now being funded in-house in order to continue our work with this community of young learners. Allowing the participants to inform and shape the project has been critical to its success- specifically the request to create a ‘summer camp’ in July 2022 as well as the suggestion to invite along the children of staff and researchers.   This social inclusion focused science engagement project provides an early-stage intervention for inter-generational participation in science research on human health.