The ambassadors
Undergraduate chemists get the opportunity to teach as part of their degree course
In Short
- Undergraduates can now go into schools and colleges as part of their BSc chemistry course and learn how to teach
- Ambassadors gain credits towards their degree course
Many schools and colleges in the UK are finding it increasingly difficult to recruit specialist science teachers.1 Without these teachers, the country has little hope of motivating high-quality students to study science post-16. The Undergraduate Ambassadors' Scheme (UAS), which aims to encourage science graduates into teaching, addresses these issues and is beginning to bear fruit
The Undergraduate Ambassadors' Scheme (UAS)2 was launched in 2002 by the then Training Development Agency in response to a growing shortage of subject specialist science and maths teachers in secondary schools and colleges in the UK. The basic principle of the UAS is straightforward - ie that science students spend some time during their degree on a placement in a local school or college for which they can earn academic credits that go towards their degree. UAS is offered to students as a course module which may count from 10-40 credits (each year of a UK university degree course counts as 120 credits).
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