A few days ago on Thursday 15th February Susan Garden, the Baroness Garden of Frognal from the House of Lords set out a question entitled STEM Subjects: Girls which was “To ask His Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to address the confidence gap between girls and boys studying STEM subjects at school.” and an answer from the Government was sent by Diana Barran who is responded here and she stated several comments on the STEM theme. On the previous week on Thursday 8th February another member of the House of Lords, Natalie Bennett, the Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle for Green corresponded in a discussion entitled Digital Exclusion (Communications and Digital Committee Report) and she included  “a knowledge of Plato and Aristotle should be seen as mutually exclusive with knowledge of STEM subjects and digital skills” which can be seen here.

On the previous day in Parliament, on Wednesday 7th February there was a session entitled Women and Equalities: STEM Jobs which can be seen here and it was organised by Flick Drummond who is the Conservative Meon Valley MP and she began with “What steps she is taking to help support women into science, technology, engineering and mathematics jobs.” and the Minister who responded was the Lewes MP, Maria Caulfield who began with “We are helping to get young girls and women into STEM sectors in three key ways: first, by increasing the number of young girls taking up courses.” The other person who took part was Jim Shannon, the DUP MP.

On the previous day of Tuesday, 6th February there were three sessions that took place in Parliament referring to STEM. One of them was a written session and it came from Jim Shannon who asked “To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of trends in the uptake of STEM subjects studied at universities.” and it was responded by Robert Halfon for the Government. The question and answer can be obtained from here. On the same day Caroline Nokes who is the Conservative MP for Romsey and Southampton asked another question with the headline “International Assistance: Education” and her question was answered by Andrew Mitchell from the Government and he referred with this response at the beginning “The UK is committed to supporting foundational learning (literacy, numeracy, socio-emotional skills) for all. Foundational learning is critical for achieving higher order skills and effective understanding of STEM subjects from an early age.” The question and answer can be obtained from here. The other item that took place on that day was in the Welsh Government and the session was entitled Statement by the Minister for Education and the Welsh Language: Vocational qualifications and at the end of the session Jeremy Miles who is a Labour MP stated “There are also good examples in Blaenau Gwent through the Tech Valleys STEM facilitation project, and the work that my department is doing now, together with the economy department, really is trying to identify where those good relationships exist.” That session can be obtained from here.

It will be very interested to see what happens this next week given that the Parliament has opened up again following last weeks holiday period.