Cornish College is very proud of Gemma Wildermuth (CC2022) who recently visited Paris to deliver a paper at the 72nd International Astronautical Congress, held by the International Astronautical Federation.

In short, Gemma was approached by one of her robotics team mentors who asked if she would like to contribute to a paper he was writing for a conference around engaging senior school girls in STEM subjects. Gemma respectfully disagreed with her mentor’s theory, arguing that, in her experience, high school is too late a time to garner such interest. She theorised that girls can be shown that STEM is not as daunting as it might seem by way of combining a multifaceted approach whereby senior school role models work with middle-to-upper primary students within short, fun, and engaging activities. In measuring confidence levels between boys and girls, she found the latter to be less confident yet very much capable of STEM electives.

These conversations evolved into Gemma not only contributing to her mentor’s paper but actually assembling her own paper, finding that the idea and theory would make for a compelling submission in its own right. It transpires that Gemma’s abstract was accepted to form the basis of a public presentation at the organisation’s forthcoming conference in Paris, attended largely by university lecturers and heads of big corporations.

Gemma was most pleased with the overall response to her 15-minute presentation, noting that the room was full and attendees were clearly engaged with what she had to say.

While it was perhaps a little intimidating to speak at an event not ordinarily intended for high school students, any anxieties were quickly replaced with a feeling of excitement for the fact that this body of work was finally going to be shared with others. Judging by the note-taking and carefully crafted questions from the room, delegates were genuinely
interested in this presentation.

Gemma believes that there is potential for her paper to be developed beyond its current scope, with some of her ideas therein to be problematised on a much larger scale. Since Paris, her mentor has, in fact, shared this work with a couple of individuals in the field who would be motivated to see it developed further. Going forward, Gemma is considering studying a double degree in Engineering and Architecture whilst continuing to work with her robotics team. She hopes that there will be ample opportunity to share with other young students the great insights and knowledge acquired through this invaluable, international experience.

She is grateful that the focus on student-agency at Cornish gave her the opportunity to work with Year 5 students to confirm her theories about STEM.