As a self proclaimed veteran (having organised one STEM festival for Peterborough), I thought it might be helpful to impart some useful tips to anyone looking to embark upon the same insane journey.
Before I start, I’d like to point out that this is not in any kind of logical order. It’s almost as if I am sat perched on the sofa with thoughts spilling out of my (cake deprived) mind. Maybe.
Here goes:
1. Choose co-organisers on your team who are generous, like-minded and level-headed. You’ll probably need to call on their ability and dedication to put up bunting and event decoration with you at 10pm the night before the big day.
2. Make sure one of your co-organisers is good with words. He’ll need these skills so that he can reply to the emails that make you want to curse like a fish-wife.
3. Surround yourself with awesome people who know what they are doing so that you inadvertently bask in the glow of their achievements and talent.
4. Recruit a team of dedicated and wonderful volunteers, supply them with a complicated spreadsheet so that it looks like you have put some thought into their roles and then step back and let them do their jobs on the day.
5. Use your influence on your school mum friends to get them to help you spread the word to their networks and then nag them into booking tickets on the pretense that they are ‘testing’ the booking system for you. Repeat this several times.
6. Use all your skills at begging for freebies and calling on people’s generous nature, because you will have zero budget to work with.
7. Wait for your friends to offer to help with a small task and then somehow escalate their role until they end up managing the front registration desk on the day.
8. Don’t organise another major digital event four days after the festival day because you’ll end up feeling knackered.
9. Be sure you are married to a supportive partner who is unfazed by your crazy schemes (this one should probably be the first thing on this list).
10. If anyone asks you when you will be organising the next STEM festival, don’t start sobbing and rocking on our heels, it makes people feel uncomfortable.
So, those are my top tips. Unfortunately, they don’t guarantee any success for organising a STEM festival, but I can guarantee that it will be a once in a lifetime experience, and you will make some amazing friends along the way.
4 replies on “How to organise a STEM festival and still remain sane”
What a great picture. Well done …it must have been a huge effort x
Thanks Gabs, it was definitely a team effort!
I completely agree with all your advice, but especially ‘Surround yourself with awesome people’. I did that, and one of them not only decided to organise and grow what had been a haphazard monthly meetup – but also came up with the amazing idea of a STEMFest, and pulled together a wonderful bunch of people to achieve it.
It was a totally amazing day, and it was fun to even be a very small part of it… Hopefully the sobbing and heel rocking will subside…
You’re very kind. Who knew that my control freak tendancies would be a positive thing, right? 😀