Ms Fiona Longmuir:

That is really important. The link between the physics they are learning in the classroom and the jobs that are available is not there at the moment based on the conversations we are having with young people. They are not seeing physics as an opportunity that will open lots of doors for them and lead to these high-productivity high-paying jobs so we must draw this link. Careers guidance counsellors have a significant role to play in linking the classroom to the real world and the subjects you enjoy in school to the career you might go into afterwards so they will play a significant role.

We developed a careers resource that is available on our website. We also have physical copies at events we go to that outlines 12 people who took leaving certificate physics who all went into very different paths. This is a small contribution we are making. We are giving careers guidance counsellors that resource to say physics is not necessarily what you think it is. We have the engineer and the academic in there but it also involves things like medical physics and meteorology. Sectors like finance and computing draw massively on physics graduates so it is about making the variety of doors that physics can open for you better known.