Meet the Team- Jacki Rowley
In the first of our meet the team series we speak to Jacki Rowley. She’s our Senior Consultant and all-round right-hand woman at STEAMWORKS.
There’s no better place to start our new blog series than with Jacki Rowley. From joining STEAMWORKS just over three years ago, she’s used her diverse teaching background to create a huge bank of workshop ideas that really get our participants excited.
As a Senior Consultant, Jacki spends time in our office organising our bookings, planning our clubs and creating various pre-prepared workshops for our club leaders. That doesn’t mean she’s afraid to get her hands dirty and run FabLabs herself.
“Slime is really popular, I’m always on the look out for new slime recipes,” she said. Jacki’s workshop ideas also reflect what’s going on in the world at the time.
“I get inspired by what’s on the calendar or in the news and just tend to go on from there and that leads you off on lots of different alleys.
“I try to focus on seasonal things, planning activities think about autumn or spring. Say the Euros are on, so what can we think about that? Or a super moon?”
When you’re teaching you’re always trying to maintain a certain level of calm in the classroom. But the great thing about FabLabs is that you want noise, excitement and lots of hustle and bustle.
Jacki Rowley
Jacki’s Background
Before joining us, Jacki already had a varied teaching career. After an English Literature degree, PGCE and many years work as a primary school teacher, she joined Sheffield Theatres as their education liaison officer. She spring-boarded off into different theatrical tours and visited high schools with educational workshops.
Whilst STEM workshops are a departure from her English and drama background, Jacki’s used her skills to bring creativity into science and maths.
“Teaching and performing are often one in the same thing anyway! It’s a constant performance where you’re trying to stimulate children and get them excited.
“A lot of our experiments are just about getting children excited from the get go. It’s what we aim for when we plan them because we know that what will really hook them in.”
What’s so good about working at STEAMWORKS?
“The children’s reactions when something amazing happens in a FabLab,” Jacki told us. “It’s the noise, excitement and sheer delight of children reacting to things like the lava lamps or the rockets.
“I feel like when I left teaching the exciting bits were being eroded bit by bit from the curriculum, so to be able to be a part of something that does get them enthusiastic is brilliant.”
