Nottingham University's Academy of Science and Technology (NUAST) is an 11 to 19

free school Free may refer to: Concept * Freedom, having the ability to do something, without having to obey anyone/anything * Freethought, a position that beliefs should be formed only on the basis of logic, reason, and empiricism * Emancipate, to procure ...

with STEM specialist status in

Nottingham Nottingham ( , locally ) is a city and unitary authority area in Nottinghamshire, East Midlands, England. It is located north-west of London, south-east of Sheffield and north-east of Birmingham. Nottingham has links to the legend of Robi ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe ...

Governance

The Nottingham University Academy of Science and Technology is an academy sponsored by the

University of Nottingham The University of Nottingham is a public university, public research university in Nottingham, United Kingdom. It was founded as University College Nottingham in 1881, and was granted a royal charter in 1948. The University of Nottingham belongs t ...

. It is legally a trust, with a board of 11 directors and the headteacher, who is ex-officio, and a local board of governors. It was opened in 2014 as a 14 to 19

University Technical College A university technical college (UTC) is a type of specialist secondary school in England that is led by a sponsor university and has close ties to local business and industry. These university and industry partners support the curriculum developm ...

, but transitioned into an 11-18

in September 2018. The school is a member of Nova Education Trust, which provides the school with its IT systems and teachers.

Admissions

In September 2018, the first Year 7's were admitted to the school. Year 10 admissions remained open until 2021, after which admissions only accepted eleventh and sixth form. Applications for admission are made though the home education authority. The academy has an admissions number of 120.

Curriculum

Students study a curriculum that allows for specialist study in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (

STEM Stem or STEM may refer to: Plant structures * Plant stem, a plant's aboveground axis, made of vascular tissue, off which leaves and flowers hang * Stipe (botany), a stalk to support some other structure * Stipe (mycology), the stem of a mushr ...

). At

Key Stage 4 Key Stage 4 (KS4) is the legal term for the two years of school education which incorporate GCSEs, and other examinations, in maintained schools in England normally known as Year 10 and Year 11, when pupils are aged between 14 and 16 by August 31 ...

, students can study the group of subjects designated by the government as EBacc, the

English Baccalaureate The English Baccalaureate (EBacc) is a school performance indicator in England linked to the General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) results. It measures students' attainment by calculating an average score from specified subject grades. ...

. These are the core academic subjects: English, Mathematics, History or Geography, two sciences and a language. All students study Mathematics, English Language, English Literature, Physics, Chemistry and Biology. Either ICT or Engineering is compulsory. Students make up the rest of their timetable by choosing two subjects from iMedia, Computer Science, Design and Technology, Business Studies, Media studies, History, Geography and Spanish. In 2018, the college decided to not run an iMedia option for newly admitted Year 10's, instead deciding to run a Photography option instead. In addition, they added basic PE lessons to meet the Department of Education's requirements.

Buildings

The academy is built on the former site of a fire station, on the A52 Clifton Boulevard in Dunkirk, Nottingham. It was designed by Bond Bryan Architects for BAM Construction. It has a gross internal floor area of 8,600 square metres and cost £10 million. It was completed in 2014. In addition to the standard features that one finds on a secondary school, there are specialist rooms provided for the STEM subjects. For

mechanical engineering Mechanical engineering is the study of physical machines that may involve force and movement. It is an engineering branch that combines engineering physics and mathematics principles with materials science, to design, analyze, manufacture, ...

, there are workshops with

CNC Numerical control (also computer numerical control, and commonly called CNC) is the automated control of machining tools (such as drills, lathes, mills, grinders, routers and 3D printers) by means of a computer. A CNC machine processes a pie ...

lathes, milling machines and routers. There are bench facilities for heat treatment, welding and brazing. For

electronic engineering Electronics engineering is a sub-discipline of electrical engineering which emerged in the early 20th century and is distinguished by the additional use of active components such as semiconductor devices to amplify and control electric current ...

, there is printed circuit board production and assembly equipment. The building also houses industry standard test equipment. Software is available for virtual circuit simulation and testing.

Process control An industrial process control in continuous production processes is a discipline that uses industrial control systems to achieve a production level of consistency, economy and safety which could not be achieved purely by human manual control. ...

engineering equipment allows training in

hydraulic Hydraulics (from Greek: Υδραυλική) is a technology and applied science using engineering, chemistry, and other sciences involving the mechanical properties and use of liquids. At a very basic level, hydraulics is the liquid counter ...

and pneumatic control systems. The ten dedicated science laboratories are to an industrial research standard. Across the site, there are 150 desktop PCs running

Autodesk Autodesk, Inc. is an American multinational software corporation that makes software products and services for the architecture, engineering, construction, manufacturing, media, education, and entertainment industries. Autodesk is headquartered ...

and

Adobe Adobe ( ; ) is a building material made from earth and organic materials. is Spanish for '' mudbrick''. In some English-speaking regions of Spanish heritage, such as the Southwestern United States, the term is used to refer to any kind of ...

software.

Robotic Robotics is an interdisciplinary branch of computer science and engineering. Robotics involves design, construction, operation, and use of robots. The goal of robotics is to design machines that can help and assist humans. Robotics integrate ...

s is taught using

Raspberry Pi Raspberry Pi () is a series of small single-board computers (SBCs) developed in the United Kingdom by the Raspberry Pi Foundation in association with Broadcom. The Raspberry Pi project originally leaned towards the promotion of teaching basic ...

s and

Lego Mindstorms Lego Mindstorms is a hardware and software structure which develops programmable robots based on Lego building blocks. Each version includes computer Lego bricks, a set of modular sensors and motors, and Lego parts from the Technic line to ...

. Programming is done in Python.

References

External links

{{authority control Secondary schools in Nottingham Science and technology in Nottinghamshire Free schools in England