Latitude Festival Kids Area
The Widening Participation team had the chance to go to Latitude festival in Suffolk this year, to meet hundreds and hundreds of young people interested in the world of Veterinary Science.
Latitude is no normal music festival. The combination of workshops, live acts, beautiful forest art and wilderness activities make it a perfect place for families, and that's where we were situated: in the Kids Area.
We had an amazing circus tent all to ourselves throughout the day, and we had a host of interesting activities for people to get involved with.
There was 'A visit to the vet', where you could follow a pets journey through it initial health checks, taking their heart rate and blood pressure, right up to its x-ray (if you looked closely, you could see the pet in question had swallowed an action figure!). Visitors had the chance to try out all our equipment and see for themselves how their heart rate changes once they do some running on the spot.
We also had mystery objects, where visitors could guess what our bones and plastinated organs might be, and we helped them along the way explaining where in the body it might be found, and what function it has.
Then we had Vet Tech, where we looked at the different ways technology can help both vets and biologists working with animals. We had amazing cheetah collars which have been out on animals in Botswana with our researchers, a farm directory which helps farmers get the best genetic material for their animals, and even a cow pedometer!
We also had with us our trusty Labrador Otis.
Sadly Otis isn't a real Labrador, although many festival-goers thought he might be. Otis still enjoyed coming round the arena with us and experiencing the fun festival atmosphere, Check out some of his adventure below
You've got to look cool at a festival! Otis here modelling our 91°µÍø shades.
No Helter Skelter for Otis as the sign didn't specify the price per Labrador, however he did get to go on the merry go round, and see plenty of amazing live acts.
The Widening Participation team had an amazing time at Latitude, and we met some incredible people with fantastic knowledge about animals and anatomy. We would like to thank the Kids Area organizers, and everyone who came to visit us over the three days.