Volunteers Week 2019

Here at SATRO, we owe a huge thank you to our volunteers. They are vital to us and we certainly couldn’t do what we do without them! We know it is important that volunteers feel valued and that their employers know their staff have had a productive and positive experience with us. Many of our volunteers sign up so they can ‘make a difference’ to young people and are frequently surprised by how much they have learnt from the experience themselves. 

A thank you note to our wonderful Volunteers from our Chairman, Howard Railton: 

“What SATRO delivers reflects the fantastic pool of Volunteers that we have who give so much of their time and enthusiasm to help us deliver a wide range of outstanding programmes.  STEM education and skills are a national crisis. Our Volunteers understand that the long-term future of business, innovation and invention in the UK depends on trying to do something about it. SATRO is engaged at the grass roots of education and delivers effective and inspiring STEM programmes for young people. We can only do this by harnessing the knowledge and professional experience of our volunteers without whom, SATRO would not be able to do any of these wonderful things.  Thank you all.” - Howard Railton, SATRO Chairman. 

Local Charities Day 2018

Local Charities Day 2018

Born in Austria on November 9th 1914, Hedy Lamarr (Hedwig Eva Maria Kiesler) grew up to be one to the most beautiful and gifted Hollywood actresses of the 1940s starring in a range of classic high grossing MGM films.

Unknown to the public she was also a talented inventor. Her burning desire was to be a scientist and although untrained produced some ground breaking innovations.

Her first husband was an Austrian armaments manufacturer and Hedy, a young actress, was able to mix with scientists and professionals in military technology. This first awakened her to the field of applied science. Unhappy, in 1936, she decided to divorce and leave Europe for the USA and Hollywood where her acting career would quickly blossom.

Her second husband was Howard Hughes, a film producer, aviator and inventor. She advised him on the aerodynamic shape of his aircraft designs. Recognising her genius he made available his staff and workshops so she could develop her ceaseless flow of ideas.

In 1940, WW2 was looming and the US Government set up the National Inventors Council to coordinate potential military inventions from the public. Hedy wanted to join but instead was advised to use her Film Star status to campaign for War Bonds, collecting funds for the war effort.

This did not stop Hedy inventing. She thought that military radio frequencies could be easily jammed, especially for radio controlled torpedoes. Her solution was a method now called frequency hopping. In collaboration with a pianist friend they miniaturised automatic piano player devices and synchronised them. Instead of playing piano tunes, different radio frequencies would  substitute the key notes allowing a message to be communicated across the radio spectrum.

Hedy patented their system but it was dismissed by the military. She later discovered her invention had been used in secret by the US Navy and won Government compensation.

Hedy Lamarr was finally recognised in 1997, winning the US Electronic Frontier Foundation Pioneer Award and in 2014 posthumously inducted into the US National Inventors Hall of Fame. She died on 19th January 2000 aged 85.

Hedy's greatest invention lives on! The frequency hopping method is incorporated into Bluetooth and WiFi electronics of Smartphones and mobile devices to help keep our communication secure.

Blog written by John Faulkner, SATRO Volunteer

Freya Bowden - Summer STEM Work Placement Student - Weekly Reports

The STEM placement students are sending us weekly blogs all about their experience in the world of work! 

Work experience is great and it provides students with many benefits whilst gaining skills and helping choose the right future career path for pupils. Having work experience on a Curriculum Vitae will make a person stand out to employers as they will notice they have motivation and a real passion for work. It will also help to boost a students confidence in themselves!

See how Freya is getting on with her STEM placement! 

Week One 

"During my first week at Headway I spent Monday doing background research and looking through the data the centre had. Tuesday, I spent the day with clients, helping out with their worksheets and watching the session on memory. It was interesting to see how the clients are presented with different problems (symptoms) after their acquired brain injury. 

Wednesday I spent doing further research, reading papers and accumulating data from the survey on mobile phones carried out by the clients who attended Tuesdays session. Thursday again I spent with clients, and Friday I spent beginning my report. It’s been an interesting week, I’ve enjoyed learning more about memory, acquired brain injuries and the clients."

- Freya Bowden

Lois Whitelegg - Summer STEM Work Placement - Weekly Reports

The STEM placement students are sending us weekly blogs all about their experience in the world of work! 

Work experience is great and it provides students with many benefits whilst gaining skills and helping choose the right future career path for pupils. Having work experience on a Curriculum Vitae will make a person stand out to employers as they will notice they have motivation and a real passion for work. It will also help to boost a students confidence in themselves!

See how Lois is getting on with her STEM placement!

Week One

"During my first week I was able to become familiar with the work that is being done by the charity Cardiac Risk in the Young and the Cardiac Investigations Department at St. George’s Hospital. I was able to observe the diagnostic tools that are used to diagnose heart conditions, such as ECGs, Echocardiograms and Cardiopulmonary Exercise Tests. 

I have started to look into different heart conditions, specifically those which affect younger people, which has allowed me to start gaining an understanding of why research into inherited cardiac conditions is so important. I have also been able to start thinking about possible ideas for a project."

Week Two

"This week I decided to base my project on the psychological effects of a heart condition on an athlete. This is something that little research has been done on despite the large lifestyle adaptions a heart condition may lead to, particularly regarding physical activity. As well as this I have been able to shadow doctors in their clinics with patients, which has been a very valuable and interesting experience in gaining an understanding of different heart conditions and seeing the effective ways in which doctors interact with their patients."

Week Three 

"During my week I have started to research into methods of surveying patients, as well as writing my own survey to use for my study. I was also able to again be involved with the diagnostic processes, which has helped to deepen my knowledge of different heart conditions such as Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy. 

Furthermore I was able to shadow a doctor who did a Heart Failure patient ward round allowing me to go to various wards in the hospital and see the effects of Heart Failure on a range of patients in a different environment than I had been in previously, only seeing outpatients."

Week Four

"Now I have started to conduct my survey on patients and start analysing the responses. Also I have been able to assist in setting up the diagnostic tests for patients and assist in writing reports for patients. This has showed me the importance of accurately documenting the results of diagnostic tests so that they can effectively be used to help in diagnosing the patient." 

- Lois Whitelegg 

Sina Bastani - Summer STEM Work Placement - Weekly Reports

The STEM placement students are sending us weekly blogs all about their experience in the world of work! 

Work experience is great and it provides students with many benefits whilst gaining skills and helping choose the right future career path for pupils. Having work experience on a Curriculum Vitae will make a person stand out to employers as they will notice they have motivation and a real passion for work. It will also help to boost a students confidence in themselves!

See how Sina is getting on with his STEM placement!

Week One 

"I have learnt quite a lot only in the first week of my placement. We had the privilege to attend lectures given by Dr. Radu about semi-conductors, something I was entirely unfamiliar with but Radu managed to keep the lecture interesting and intriguing by involving us in his talk. He asked us to mimic the structure of semi-conductors with Play-Doh and demonstrated how its construction can be modified to maximise space. This then got followed by another brief talk from Dr. Vlad which taught us how to make a proper science paper. During the rest of the week, I familiarised myself with my subject at hand and learned valuable lessons about science research." 

Week Two 

"The second week was eye opening for me. My teammate and I got stuck on a certain aspect of our research and tried to make sense of it using our combined logic and by conversing with each other. After a few more hours of research, we completely understood the topic we used to be stuck on which was very rewarding. We also had the opportunity to visit the clean room, which is a laboratory at the University of Surrey designed to reduce contamination at maximum. The lab technician also introduced us to the most important pieces of technology and instruments in the clean room." 

Week Three 

"During the third week, our time was mostly spent experimenting. Again, we have come across a dead end when our experiment did not work properly and showed unenthusiastic results. We have tried to use our common sense and had a crack at working out the problem with the help of Dr. Vlad, but we have not come up with a significant solution. In a desperate attempt, I emailed the scientist that worked on the scientific paper we were concerned with and with much satisfaction, I received an email back from Australia by that same scientist informing us of ways to possibly improve our experiment. We have also spent time in the mechanical engineering department to test the tensile strength of our material." 

- Sina Bastani

Hannah Wagner - Summer STEM Work Placement - Weekly Reports

The STEM placement students are sending us weekly blogs all about their experience in the world of work! 

Work experience is great and it provides students with many benefits whilst gaining skills and helping choose the right future career path for pupils. Having work experience on a Curriculum Vitae will make a person stand out to employers as they will notice they have motivation and a real passion for work. It will also help to boost a students confidence in themselves!

See how Hannah is getting on with her STEM placement!

Week One

"The aim of my project is to create a nanotechnological mask using photolithography. Overall the current flows through transistors, which are semiconductor devices that are used to amplify or switch electronic signals and power. The process of photolithography involves indenting the base of a substrate using light. 

During my first week, I gained an understanding as to how semiconductors work to create transistors: by connecting the source, gate, drain, and semiconductor to an insulator, electric current is able to flow. 

However, voltage must also be applied to positively charge the gate and drain, which causes electrons begin to flow from the source to the drain via the semiconductor. Upon understanding how the semiconductor circuit works and doing research into the transistors, I was able to begin working on CAD programs to design more complex transistors." 

-Hannah Wagner