ScottishPower Energy Network’s innovative PowerWise education programme has scooped the Community Initiative of the Year award at The Utility Industry Achievement Awards 2008.
The PowerWise Classroom Education Programme is aimed at teaching primary school children aged four to eleven years of the potential dangers of electricity in the home and outdoors environment. In 2007 more than 55,000 school children in ScottishPower’s operating areas of central and southern Scotland and Merseyside and North Wales received important electrical safety messages through the programme, taking the total to over 180,000 children in the four years it has been running.
The programme is also backed by an interactive website, which can be accessed at www.powerwise.org.uk. The site is packed with lesson plans, interactive games and electricity information that both teachers and parents can use. Ollie and Sparky, two loveable characters from ScottishPower’s safety team, help five to eleven year old children to learn the dangers of playing near to live electrical sources, discover how electricity reaches the home and teach them some interesting facts about its’ history and science.
For secondary school children, PowerWise focuses on the scientific aspects of electrical safety by encouraging older children to think logically about electricity and take part in a number of interactive programmes such as designing and building a wind farm; or planning and delivering a rock concert.
In 2007 the PowerWise website received over 38,000 hits.
This award was given to recognise the significant effort and care that has gone into the project and recognises the initiative’s effectiveness and contribution it has made to the community.
Dr Steve Deacon, Director of Health and Safety at ScottishPower, said: “We are delighted to have won this very prestigious award, and it reflects the hard work that has gone into making PowerWise a relevant and informative educational programme. The feedback we have had from schools and children who have taken part has been very good, and it is our intention to keep visiting more schools and to speak to more children. By continuing to educate children about the potential dangers of electricity we hope that we will be able to help reduce future accidents that could easily be avoided.”
Media information: Paul Ferguson 0141 566 4515 / 07702 665 924