A new report from Nesta, the innovation foundation, has revealed that schemes which get young people interested in invention and innovation currently reach under 1.5% of the UK’s school children each year, despite international research(1) showing that ‘exposure to innovation’ in childhood influences whether an individual will go onto innovate themselves. The UK would need more than five times this level of activity for each school child to have just one ‘hands on’ invention opportunity during their 13 years at school.

The report, Opportunity Lost: how inventive potential is squandered and what to do about it, maps out these schemes and shows a significant regional divide in their availability:

-Pupils in the South of England (including London) are twice as likely to have opportunities to take part in one of these schemes as those in the Midlands, and 1.6 times more likely than those in the North.

-Scotland is better priming its future innovators - pupils there are 3.5 times more likely to take part as those in England, while there are very few schemes covering the whole of Northern Ireland and Wales.

Schemes were listed in the report if they could help to build children’s innovation ‘capital’. This includes helping children to meet inventors, building their skills and knowledge relating to invention, changing perceptions about who can be an inventor and helping children to get practical experience of inventing.

The report is released on the birthday of Ada Lovelace, the19th Century English mathematician who is often credited as being the first computer programmer. Over 200 years since her birth, there is still a surprising lack of female inventors - and most inventors (like Lovelace herself) still come from well-off backgrounds.

Between 2000 and 2015, just 7% of the people who applied for patents in the UK were women(2). There is less information available for those from low-income backgrounds but data shows that only 15% of UK scientists are from working-class households(3) and almost half of British Nobel Prize winners in the last 25 years were privately educated(4). Despite this, the report reveals that less than one in five of schemes listed specifically target girls, and that overall, schools with better-off pupil populations are more likely to take part.

Nesta is calling for:-

1)All young people to have an opportunity to have at least one ‘hands-on’ experience of innovation or invention during their time at school.

2)Fostering innovators and improving diversity in innovation to be a shared priority across education and innovation policy.

3)Better coordination across providers to create a more evidence-based, consistent and impactful offer for young people.

4)A strategy to increase diversity in innovation to focus on young people’s networks, not only their skills.

5)Government to invest in more research and data on diversity in innovation and pathways into innovation.

6)The school curriculum to support young people’s invention skills and promote exposure to innovation.

Madeleine Gabriel, Head of Inclusive Innovation, Nesta says, “Inventors are overwhelmingly white, privileged and male, and this means we’re missing out on a lot of talent. The UK government directs a lot of effort to optimising tax incentives for innovative firms - these are estimated to cost £4.45bn a year. By contrast we seem to be massively under-investing in building a larger and more diverse pool of future innovators. We need to improve the reach, effectiveness and impact of interventions to provide exposure to innovation for all young people.”

Katherine Mengarden, chief educator at Little Inventors, an organisation that works with schools, museums and hospitals to run workshops to inspire children to invent, says, “Creativity and problem-solving are core skills which will be essential to the next generations. There is great value in taking children’s ideas seriously, using the lens of invention to give them the tools to explore the world around them through STEAM and to nurture their confidence and natural curiosity. In short, we think inventing should be on the curriculum!”

-ENDS-

For more information contact Juliet Grant in Nesta’s press office on 020 7438 2668 or m: 07866 949047, [email protected]

Footnotes

1. Bell, A, R Chetty, X Jaravel, N Petkova, and J Van Reenen. (2017) ‘Who Becomes an Inventor in America? The Importance of Exposure to Innovation’. NBER Working Paper No. 24062, December (2017) The Equality of Opportunity Project. Available at: http://www.equality-of-opportunity.org/assets/documents/inventors_paper.pdf
2. Intellectual Property Office (2016) Gender Profiles in UK Patenting. An Analysis of Female Inventorship.
3. Laurison, D., & Friedman, S. (2016). The Class Pay Gap in Higher Professional and Managerial Occupations. American Sociological Review, 81(4), 668–695.
4. Kirby, P. (2016) ‘Leading people 2016: the educational backgrounds of the UK professional elite’. Sutton Trust Report.

Notes to editors:

About Nesta

Nesta is a global innovation foundation. We back new ideas to tackle the big challenges of our time, making use of our knowledge, networks, funding and skills. We work in partnership with others, including governments, businesses and charities. We are a UK charity that works all over the world, supported by a financial endowment. To find out more visit www.nesta.org.uk

Nesta is a registered charity in England and Wales 1144091 and Scotland SC042833.