By Maria Iredale, PESGB

It was a snowy Tuesday when I headed up to Sheffield to present fossils at Sheffield Girls High School to the winners of the Earth Science Teachers Annual Nationwide Competition.

PESGB has been involved with ESTA for several years as it’s an excellent way to support the teaching of Geology in schools.Even though it is not on the curriculum for most UK schools, those that do teach it have passionate teachers and interested students.

The ESTA competitions are a great initiative for schools. In 2016 students had to create videos or posters about their field trip experiences and in 2017 they had to create posters about the naming of the dinosaurs which tied in well with our GEOLiteracy Tour headlined by Professor Ken Lacovara.In 2018, the competition has not yet been set formerly but I believe it relates to natural resources.

As a keen supporter I wanted to play a role and took the opportunity to go to Sheffield to present the winners with their fossils.The students were lovely and many of our members would have enjoyed themselves pottering round the Geology classroom.Their Geology teacher was presented with a fossil on behalf of the school and they are keen to continue in participation in these national competitions.Of the A level geology cohort, a number were going to study Geology at University, though weren’t sure where this would lead one student had already decided that they wanted a career in mining.