Member Article

PTC delivers home schooling boost for STEM pupils with Onshape offer

Thousands of school pupils studying Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) have been given a welcome boost with their online learning through PTC®’s Onshape® Education plan.

The digital technology specialist, which has its UK headquarters in Farnborough, has been using its expertise to help support children during the ongoing pandemic and has equipped them with the latest CAD software so they can collaborate with design and engineering projects online.

Pupils can create an account in just a few seconds and are able to access a platform that is used by industry and thousands of companies across the world, futureproofing their learning for when they actually start their careers.

“The Prime Minister announced last week that schools will not be opening until the 8th of March at the very earliest, meaning parents and children will be home schooling for many weeks to come,” explained Bernhard Eberl, Director of Education Relations at PTC.

“Paramount to remote learning success is the need for students, no matter their location, to have access to hardware, such as laptops and tablets, and the necessary software to keep the continuity of the curriculum.”

He continued: “STEM is such a massive subject and one we are extremely passionate about, as we want to ensure the UK benefits from a strong pipeline of design and engineering talent.

“Onshape is one of the most powerful Software as a Service (SaaS) platforms in the world and gives pupils all the tools they need to create and modify CAD drawings and collaborate on projects through the cloud. In fact, last week we announced the milestone of one million Onshape education users – those figures speak for themselves.

“Very few teachers are IT specialists. With large classes and limited time, installing software into students’ machines and getting licenses is an unnecessary drain on valuable time. Furthermore, constant updates require further organisational problems, but with cloud applications, pupils are always running the latest software.”

The Chiltern Academy (part of the Chiltern Trust) is one of the first schools to take advantage of this new offering and adopt PTC’s Onshape software, enabling students to use the same technology as potential future employers.

Dan Pallet, Senior Engineering Teacher, commented: “Our students have had complete continuity during lockdown and the subsequent remote learning that it has forced.

“Onshape allows students not to be tied to a classroom - they can log into their account on any computer or mobile device and enjoy the benefits of virtual learning.

“The Academy has moved to Onshape due to the flexibility it offers over other educational CAD offerings. Students are sent a link to sign in with their Google accounts and that’s it. Another important aspect is that, from a teachers’ perspective, we have a complete overview of their work allowing us to collaborate with students, support students remotely and even track their usage.”

PTC has been at the forefront of manufacturing’s Covid-19 response, providing its Augmented Reality expertise to create hundreds of virtual engineers to help drive the VentilatorChallengeUK Consortium.

More information on PTC’s Onshape Education Enterprise plan offering can be found at https://www.onshape.com/en/education/

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Russ Cockburn .