Pupils from Applemore, Testwood, The Grange and Arnewood schools enjoy British Science Week at Brockenhurst College

More than 200 year 10 pupils enjoyed an inflatable planetarium at Brockenhurst College as part of celebrations for British Science Week.

The eye-catching installation could accommodate 25 people at a time and included an automated presentation about the solar system.

The children from five local schools mixed with 300 college students to attend a range of sessions led by staff and visiting doctors and professors during the special week.

Pupils from Applemore College attended a presentation by Dr Angela May, a freelance pharmaceutical consultant, and heard talks about computational modelling and engineering from representatives of Bournemouth University.

Learners from Testwood School in Totton, The Grange School in Christchurch, and Ballard School, New Milton, enjoyed a geography presentation by Dr Annabelle Boulay from the University of Winchester, a computational thinking talk by Dr Claire Ancient, also from the university, and and courses in computing from Dr Shikun Zhou of the University of Portsmouth.

Later in the week New Forest Academy School visited and watched an Earth sciences presentation by Professor Tim Henstock of the University of Southampton.

There was also a talk about biological anthropology from Dr Heidi Dawson-Hobbis from Winchester University and a lecture by Dr Keiron Roberts on sustainability in civil engineering.

Ballard School’s Head of science, Aaron Markar, said: “This year's event surpassed all expectations and was even better than last year, which is no small feat.

“Our recent visit was brilliant, with well organised activities that captivated our students from start to finish – the opportunity to interact with passionate educators and professionals was inspiring.

“The hands-on experiments, robotics workshop and talks were not only educational but also fun, sparking curiosity and excitement in everyone.”

The event was hosted by Brockenhurst College Principal & CEO Helen Odhams and was sponsored by Honeywell.

The keynote speaker was Professor Dame Wendy Hall, who is credited as being part of the team that created the World Wide Web. She told the children that when starting out, she was told by her headmistress that “the medical profession was not for women”.

She instead went to study at the University of Southampton, and went on as part of a team to invent the Microcosm hypermedia system in the 1980s, which was a forerunner to the World Wide Web.

She said: “I have loved being a scientist – being a scientist just opens doors you can’t imagine.

“You feel you can change the world if you’re a scientist or an engineer – we are so important in this world today.”

She ended her speech by telling the students: “Be ambitious, be bold and be confident, and get people to help you do that, and you’ll have a wonderful time in life, and you’re getting a great start from being here at Brock.”

After the speech, prizes were handed out to high achieving students who won in the STEM Awards.

A total of 30 awards were then presented to winners in 15 different STEM categories.

Winner of the gold award for geology A level, Juliette Jagger from Ringwood, said: “It is an absolutely amazing feeling just to be nominated to receive an award in an area of science, let alone actually win it.

“The best way I can describe it is gratefulness that the effort and dedication I put into my studies is recognised.

“Studying Geology at Brock has been an even more brilliant experience than I had expected.”