Ørsted’s East Coast Skills Fund Backs STEM Education and Training

Ørsted has named the winners of the second round of its annual GBP 75,000 East Coast Skills Fund, part of the company’s GBP 465,000 East Coast Community Fund 20-year annual commitment and community engagement programme for Hornsea Project One and Race Bank offshore wind farms.

Of the total amount of GBP 75,000, four organisations delivering projects relating to Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (STEM) education and training are sharing GBP 65,000, with the further GBP 10,000 awarded to two colleges within the Fund’s coastal area of benefit to be used to help finance local students who are unable to access traditional funding streams for support.

STEM-related organisations awarded a total of GBP 65,000 include the Teacher Scientist Network, STEM Learning, Franklin College, and West Norfolk Academies Trust.

The two colleges that will share GBP 10,000 are the College of West Anglia and the Grimsby Institute.

As well as contributing GBP 75,000 a year to the East Coast Skills Fund, Ørsted has also partnered with Teach First to support the organisation on a number of challenging targets to improve the teacher attraction and retention, and pupil progression in Grimsby, Hull and Merseyside.

Natasha Nanuck, Senior Stakeholder Advisor, said: “Our community funds are designed to give back to the communities in which we operate, but we’ve ringfenced a part of that specifically to enable organisations to develop and deliver STEM-related training. As a predominately engineering-based company, we recognise the importance of developing STEM skills, especially in the areas where we will be operating for a number of years.”

“We look forward to seeing the results from this round of funding; each project looks set to deliver an engaging programme and we will announce when the next round of funding will be open to applications early next year,” Nanuck said.