With the national fair over, the regional Big Bang Fairs are taking place. These aim to “inspire and enthuse the next generation of engineers and scientists”. This year the Nottingham Maths Jam group will be at the East Midlands fair repeating our puzzles stall, previously seen at the East Midlands Big Bang Fair 2011.

Maths Jam stall at the East Midlands Big Bang Fair 2011

The fairs in my part of the world are the East Midlands (East Midlands Conference Centre, University of Nottingham, 28 June 2012) and West Midlands (Thinktank, Birmingham, 26 June 2012), both organised by David Ault and his team at By Design who ran the very successful 2011 East Midlands fair. You can find your nearest via the Big Bang website.

One major reason for attending the fairs is to enter a CREST or STEM project to the National Science & Engineering Competition (East Midlands competition page; West Midlands competition page). According to the website, this

seeks to showcase and reward the best student projects from every area of science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM). It is open to all 11-18 year olds living in the UK.
Students entered projects by attending a Big Bang Near Me event. The best entries from these are invited to showcase their project at The Big Bang: UK Young Scientists’ and Engineers’ Fair, held every year.
There is over £50,000 of prizes available including cash awards and trips abroad. Prizes are available for teams and individuals, for different age groups (Junior: 11 to 14 years; Intermediate: 15 to 16; Senior: 17 to 18 years) and across a range of disciplines and themes. The overall individual winners in the senior age category will be crowned the UK Young Scientist of the Year or the UK Young Engineer of the Year.

Find out more at the competition website. So what are you waiting for? Register to attend your local Fair via the website.