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School Captain Ivin Jose’s imaginative short story, looking at climate change through the eyes of an elderly, world-travelling balloonist, has won him the top prize in the national Science Challenge Competition 2020.

Ivin’s 1,200-word feature took both the top prize in its category and the Overall Schools Winner Award, judged by Lord Robert Winston, in the annual Royal College Science Union (RSCU) competition. The RCSU is the student union for students at Imperial College London from the Faculty of Natural Sciences.

Feedback from the competition markers lauded Ivin’s “unique” style in a “gentle yet captivating” essay. One marker wrote: “The message is delivered subtly, but without detracting from its importance.” A second marker told Ivin: “It is clear that you are very talented at scientific writing, which is generally a very tricky thing to do!”

Ivin, of Year 12, was shortlisted as one of the three finalists for his category and was invited to the awards ceremony in the Royal Society of Chemistry Library.

Unfortunately, the event coincided with QE’s Senior Awards Ceremony, at which Ivin not only won several prizes, but was also scheduled to deliver a vote of thanks as School Captain. His father therefore attended the competition ceremony in his stead, where scientist, doctor and TV presenter Professor Lord Winston presented the prizes. Lord Winston has been the ambassador for the Science Challenge for 12 years.

Ivin said: “I was delighted and surprised to learn that I had won the awards for both the feature category and the Overall Schools Winner Award.” He won £500, with the prize package also including a visit to the House of Lords.

Headmaster Neil Enright said: “My congratulations go to Ivin on this exceptional achievement. He is an exemplary pupil, achieving high academic standards and contributing fully to extra-curricular activities, while showing great dedication to serving QE in his role as School Captain.”

Ivin was alerted to the competition by Academic Enrichment Tutor and Physics teacher Gillian Deakin. There were four categories: video, essay, feature and freestyle. Ivin chose the feature category, for which entrants had to cover “what good climate means to different people, and what this means for how we respond to climate change”.

“I chose to do the feature article question, as the blend of creativity and scientific fact appealed to me.”

The guest judge for this category was Mun Keat Looi, a science writer, who was awarded the silver Rising Star Award at the 2015 British Media Awards. He is the author of two books, Big Questions in Science: The quest to solve the great unknowns and the Geek Guide to Life.

Ivin said: “I wrote my feature article titled Memories of an Old World Traveller. I decided that it would be interesting to explore the feature article question from the perspective of an older narrator in order to explore how much the earth’s climate has changed over time, as well as my desire to motivate and inspire readers to action.”

The article tells the story of a 92-year-old hot air balloonist reflecting on happy memories of travelling the world and “witnessing the stunning peaks of the Himalayas, tasting the spices of Asia and beholding the beauty of the Alaskan Northern Lights”.

One of the marker’s commented on this aspect of the feature: “It is very interesting to introduce so many different cultures’ approaches to climate science, and you have done this very well.”

Realising in his old age that the climate is rapidly changing, the traveller-narrator gets out his balloon for one final journey to investigate humanity’s response to the crisis. The essay finishes with the narrator’s thoughts on the comprehensive measures that will be necessary to resolve the problem of global warming.

• Read Ivin’s winning entry, Memories Of An Old World Traveller.

Two QE boys are among the prizewinners in a national competition aimed at finding better designs for electric vehicle charging points.

Year 8’s Tharsan Nimalan won a prize in the seven–14 category, while Ashwin Sridhar, of Year 10, achieved success in the 14-–19 age group in the Eco-Innovators Competition run by the Government’s Office for Low Emission Vehicles (OLEV).

Their success came as the Government announced that a ban on selling new petrol, diesel or hybrid cars in the UK would be brought forward from 2040 to 2035 at the latest. Prime Minister Boris Johnson made the announcement as the country plans to host the annual United Nations climate change summit, COP 26, which is being held in Glasgow in the autumn.

The brief for the competition was to create a design for on-street electric vehicle (EV) charging points that were innovative, iconic and beautiful. At QE, entries were handled jointly by the Geography and Technology departments.

Geography teacher Nilisha Shah said: “I congratulate Tharsan and Ashwin on their success. As the Government’s announcement shows, universal use of electric vehicles is an idea whose time has clearly come, yet there is still much work to be done in making our cities ready. Innovative, creative thinking such as Tharsan’s and Ashwin’s is likely to prove essential if the UK is to get the infrastructure right.”

Tharsan went through a number of design ideas and drafts before settling on his submitted design, which was based upon a large tree. The trunk had a spiral staircase which users could walk up to reach lounge-style leisure facilities – perhaps a restaurant – at the top of the “tree”.

The intention behind this, he explained, was to help EV users pass the time whilst their vehicle charged and even make the charging point a desirable destination – thus overcoming the perceived drawback of electric vehicles that users would have nothing to do while re-charging. Tharsan wanted, in fact to make non-electric car users “jealous of the experience they could be having”.

His design involved the use of lightweight, more sustainable and recyclable metals and other materials, with green planting on the roof. Vehicles would be parked around the base for charging, with cables pulled down from the trunk and plugged in wherever the connection point is on a vehicle.

Ashwin designed a charging station with a “contemporary aesthetic” and a “self-maintaining garden to absorb pollution”. He envisaged a vertical garden some 3 metres high which would collect rainwater and self-irrigate, featuring green plants and mosses that are good at capturing carbon.

Ashwin envisaged targeting high-pollution areas in terms of locations for his charging station, which would also be designed to provide easy access.

Even before learning about the competition, Ashwin had already been thinking about charging point designs, having seen existing ones around London and thought that they could be made better. “They should be more than charging points,” he said, pointing out that ones created according to his designs would not only help “green” the urban landscape, but could usefully act as a source of information, for tourists, for example. Since so many charging points were going to be needed, it was important to get more functionality out of the space.

QE attracted a high-class field of some of the best and brightest robotics enthusiasts from London schools when it hosted its VEX EDR senior tournament.

Eight awards were on offer – the highest at any school-based regional competition this year – and all 20 teams were keen to pick up some silverware.

Headmaster Neil Enright said: “Robotics is a hugely popular extra-curricular activity at QE, with our boys enjoying national and international competition successes. We are therefore pleased to be able to give something back to school robotics by hosting tournaments here.”

Participants in the QE North Regional competition included the reigning national champions, St Olave’s Grammar School from Orpington, as well as Greig City Academy in Hornsey and The John Warner School in Hoddesdon.

QE entered four teams: HYBRID, comprising Year 12 pupils, and SYNAPSE, ECLIPSE and Technogear, whose team members are all in Year 10 and were thus the youngest competitors in this age group.

Head of Technology Michael Noonan said “Following on from the tremendous success of the IQ Regional event for junior teams which we hosted at the end of last term, there was excitement and anticipation aplenty in the Shearly Hall as the senior event got underway. Our teams were in confident mood and eager to prove their mettle on home ground.

“There was high drama from the very beginning when QE’s SYNAPSE team, which had been confident of putting in a strong performance, faced a setback when their robot failed the routine inspection by the very narrowest of margins. The team suddenly faced a major undertaking – rebuild the ‘bot’ whilst also trying to practise and prepare for the competition. Their gallant efforts meant that a newly constructed, but, as yet, untested, robot was ready in time for qualification, but it put them under a great deal of pressure,” said Mr Noonan.

It was an intensive day of preparation and competition. All the teams were extremely busy both with practising and with forging relationships with teams from other schools with a view to forming alliances at a later stage in the event. They also had to contend with the four circulating judges, who interviewed the participants for the Design, Excellence, Think, Judges’ and Build awards.

Toby Reisch, Systems Engineering Manager at Cummins Inc and the Design/Excellence Judge said: ““I was enormously impressed with the quality of the work from all of the teams as well as the clear dedication to the task. The use and understanding of many industry-standard processes was great to see coupled with extensive innovation and lateral thinking.”

And Mark Jones, also a Design/Excellence judge said “The standard of the design and build was very good, especially with those teams that are new to the VEX and VRC competitions. The teams were knowledgeable about their robots and the processes that they had been through.”

When the competition began in earnest, QE’s team HYBRID had some challenging initial games, achieving some tight wins. In their second qualification, match they signalled their intent, as well as their capabilities as an “offensive juggernaut”, in the Tower Takeover game, scoring an impressive 76 points, Mr Noonan reported. This put them on the radar of other strong teams, and despite narrow losses in two of their eight games, they remained a favourite to take a high-ranking position in their alliance selection later in the day.

For team SYNAPSE, the scale of the challenge of rebuilding and practising simultaneously proved too much, as they succumbed to more losses than wins. The School’s other two Year 10 teams performed valiantly; Technogear finished in eigth position in a highly competitive field, and ECLIPSE finished 13th.

The alliance selection was hotly anticipated, with all 20 teams having the opportunity to compete. Team Technogear profited from their eighth-ranked position to select their QE classmates, ECLIPSE, while Team SYNAPSE paired up with a team from Westminster, aiming to upset the odds in a preliminary quarter-final. As expected, team HYBRID was selected by the number one-ranked team, Control Freaks from The John Warner School (JWS). They went on to form what would prove to be an unbeatable alliance.

Drama unfolded throughout the elimination rounds, as lower ranked teams, ties and close calls for referees added great atmosphere and excitement to the occasion. As the semi-finals drew to a close, the formidable QE/JWS alliance had overcome all of their opponents with ease, winning all their eliminators by an average score of 44 points.

Team SYNAPSE’s alliance unfortunately could not overcome their first obstacle, losing out in a closely fought tie. However, it was the surprise package of the day – the all-QE alliance of the Year 10 teams, who reached the decider – narrowly beating an all-JWS alliance in the quarters, and a JWS/Olave’s alliance in the semis.

In the final round, the action started in an unexpected way, when the number one-ranked team changed their autonomous routine. This tactic proved crucial, as the scramble for cubes ended in a flurry of scoring, de-scoring and stacking of cubes in protected zones. Ultimately, the highly offensive tactics of the higher ranked alliance prevailed, with QE-JWS winning out with a score line of 65-20. The audience recognised the efforts of the teams in reaching the pinnacle of the competition, as did the judging panels.

Not for the first time this year, QE had both reigned victorious and lost the final in the same action! However, the audience recognised the efforts of the teams in reaching the pinnacle of the competition, as did the judging panels. Team Technogear were awarded the Design Award for the second time in four days, but the majority of the spoils went to Hybrid – winning the Teamwork, Skills and Excellence Awards. With only one competition left before the signature and National Championships, this event proved to be an invaluable exercise in building skills and experience for these teams at the highest stage.

“I have to thank my colleagues Sean Kelly, Shane Maheady, Gillian Deakin, Jonathan Leigh, Lydia Jowsey-Alexander and Liberty Kimber for their contribution in setting up and helping to run the event,” concluded Mr Noonan.

The competition came just days after QE’s teams had pitted their wits against some of the finest VEX EDR Teams in the country at the GCA Regional event. “The same teams took part against high-quality opposition from the powerhouses of south east schools robotics,” said Mr Noonan. After the early bouts, Queen Elizabeth’s teams were placed highest, with SYNAPSE ranked first and ECLIPSE ranked second. Team Technogear ranked right at the bottom at 15th. Year 10’s Heemy Kalam from team SYNAPSE selected the experienced St Olave’s School’s Download Complete Team – reigning national champions – to be their partners in the elimination matches.

“Team ECLIPSE were then faced with a conundrum: did they pair up with their next highest ranked team, or did they choose familiarity in team Technogear, and hoist them up from lowly 15th Position to be part of the second overall-ranked alliance?” said Mr Noonan. They chose their classmates.

“The QE/St Olave’s pairing quickly made light work of their competitors, whilst the all-QE alliance were desperately unlucky to be denied by a falling robot and then to miss out by a single point. SYNAPSE-Download Complete went on to win their semi-final by 12 points, with their final match proving to be their tightest in elimination; they won by 12 points.

“Great credit is due to their drivers and designers, as well as their programmers for an autonomous routine which proved effective throughout,” said Mr Noonan.

Technogear were crowned Design Award winners and Robot Skills Award winner, making QE robotics the winners of three out of four awards on offer on the day.

The teams were made up as follows:

• HYBRID (Year 12): Devin Karia, Tanishq Mehta, James Tan, Daniel Radzik-Rahman, Rishi Amin and Deshraam Ganeshamoorthy,
• SYNAPSE (Year 10): Bhunit Santhiramoulesan, Ashwin Sridar, Heemy Kalam, Jao-Yong Tsai, Chakshu Chopra, Vedaangh Rungta,
• ECLIPSE (Year 10): Frank Zhang, Arjun Arunkumar, Jashwanth Parimi, Raghav Rajaganesh, Arya Bhatt, Akhil Walia,
• Technogear (Year 10): Anubhav Rathore, Aditya Khanna, Dylan Domb, Yash Shah, Utkarsh Bhamidimarri, Anish Rana.

Queen Elizabeth’s School has taken the main prize in the Institution of Civil Engineers’ #ICanEngineer competition at the first attempt.

One team were crowned the overall winners, while a second won the Sustainability Award, which means that in its first year of entry, QE secured half of the four prizes available in a competition organised by one of the most pre-eminent engineering organisations in the world.

Congratulating the finalists, ICE London Director Jonathan Baggs said: “The #ICanEngineer Competition has shown that our schools are full of budding engineers and innovators.

“This year’s competition looked at improving London’s reliance against the effects of climate change to stop future flooding – which has such a wide scope. I’ve been really impressed with the approach the students took to consider all the possibilities in great detail. Every group should be incredibly proud of themselves. I hope that these students now see the creative and practical applications of engineering to solve some of the biggest challenges in society.”

QE Teacher of Technology Shane Maheady said: “This competition was an exciting challenge and an experience which will certainly aid our students in the future. We were very keen for them to enter because it offered them the opportunity to design a solution to a real-world problem.”

Now in its fourth year, the #ICanEngineer competition, organised by the ICE London Graduates and Students committee, has continued to grow. This year, more than 50 pupils competed from schools across the London boroughs.

The award-winners were presented with their prizes at a special event held at the central London offices of Jacobs, the international engineering group. As part of a day of activities, the finalists participated in bridge and dome-building workshops inspired by the views along the River Thames.

“The event was extremely well organised and enjoyable to attend. We’ll certainly be entering this competition again next year,” added Mr Maheady.

Among those the boys and their teachers met at Jacobs’ offices was Old Elizabethan Karan Dewnani (2006–2013), who works for Jacobs as a Civil Engineer in the rail industry and who, as a STEM Ambassador, was supporting the competition organisers on the day.

“Personally, I was very impressed with their submissions,” said Karan. “I would like to pass on my congratulations to everyone involved, especially as QE won both the sustainability prize as well as the overall competition. I look forward to seeing the trophy in the School the next time I’m around.”

The dual flood defence and water storage scheme designed by Arya Bhatt, Heemy Kalam, Dylan Domb and Ashwin Sridhar took the main prize. Named ProWater Defence System, the scheme took into consideration existing infrastructure and the current multiple uses of the River Thames. The team used digital technologies such as computer-aided design (CAD). They also produced a demonstration video to show how the scheme could work.

The Sustainability Prize went to another creative QE project, The Thames Floodplain Protection Plan. This was designed by Jashwanth Parimi, Amogh Bhartia, Utkarsh Bhamidimarri and Siddarth Jana. Their design harnessed energy from the water to generate a renewable alternative power source. The team created a website and two videos explaining the details of the plan, as well as one for a public audience explaining why it is needed.

All those in the final also received a ‘goody bag’ from the ICE and its competition supporters; Arup, Jacobs, WSP and Thames Water.

Queen Elizabeth’s School hosted its first-ever inter-school VEX IQ robotics event – and the QE teams took half the prizes awarded.

One QE team took joint first place with a team from The Henrietta Barnett School in the regional tournament’s teamwork finals – and thus secured early qualification for the national finals – while another two were joint second out of the 28 teams from eight north London schools taking part.

QE’s Head of Technology, Michael Noonan, said the event had been acclaimed by visitors as a “roaring success”, with the “action-packed finale of the teamwork competition proving to be the cherry on top”. One distinguished visitor on the day – Stephen Sadler, VEX mentor at East Barnet School and a VEX World Hall of fame member – had his own word of encouragement for the QE organisers: “Great show and the place was buzzing – well done!”

For the past two years, QE teams have not only achieved national success, but have also progressed to the world VEX IQ finals in the US.

Mr Noonan said: “The teams of Queen Elizabeth’s competed well in this regional round and can hopefully take what they have learned from this competition to further their claims to national qualification and regional success.”

The QE-hosted tournament involved a full day of robotics challenges, beginning with set-up and team inspections, followed by the two-hour skills competition.

After that, it was time for the teamwork competition, in which two teams are required to work together, often, but not always, with teams from other schools. Teamwork qualification matches took place either side of lunch. The final hour was devoted to the teamwork finals and the announcement of the day’s awards.

“The real drama of the day came in the teamwork finals,” said Mr Noonan. With many of the teams, including QE’s Silicon Vortex, Cyber Storm and Hypercharg, performing at a high standard, there was a danger of deadlock developing, he said.

However, a combined team from Greig City Academy and The Henrietta Barnett School broke through “scoring an excellent 108 – at the time equalling the national teamwork high score”.

“This gave the all-QE combination of Gyrofusion and Gearsquad (already ranked as the second overall alliance) the tall task of breaking the national record in order to advance as the overall first ranked alliance. High drama followed, as a packed crowd of over 200 seated in the ‘bleachers’ voiced healthy support for the home finalist. As the robots came to rest, it was clear that a new high score may have been achieved – and a huge roar erupted from the stand. Judges, referees and volunteers checked scores carefully, and when the new UK record of 111 flashed up on the screen, the home crowd was delirious!

“However, the drama was not yet over, because the overall first-ranked alliance of QE’s Hyperdrive and HBS’s Rampage (also the current number 1-ranked team in the UK in the skills category) had to have their say. After some early setbacks in the match, some highly skilled driving from the respective ‘closing’ drivers saw a flurry of late activity, and it looked as though a strong final score was in the offing. One could hear a pin drop as audience members tried to work out if this had eclipsed the mighty 111 national record set just before – and so it proved, as Queen Elizabeth’s and HBS had combined to equal the national record and thus tie the overall competition!

“What followed was a spectacle so rare that it was not seen for the entirety of last season at IQ – a teamwork tiebreaker to decide the champion! The idea behind the tiebreaker is to set the same score, but to do it faster, as time left over can often be the deciding factor in determining the overall champion.

“First up went the all-QE team. In the rush to set a faster high score, QE’s double act were cruelly denied by a falling game element, losing them 20 points and leaving their final score at 96.”

“This made their tiebreaker opponents’ task a simple procession to victory: accordingly, they played it safe and simply did what was required to score 100 points, and in doing so won the tie-breaker and the overall tournament.”

“Our tournament champions, Hyperdrive, were ecstatic in victory, but also aware that this was not the end of the road for them: they know that more improvement is required to achieve highly on a national scale.

“There was some consolation for Gearsquad after their defeat in the tiebreak, since they came away with the Design award for their meticulous design notebook and attention to detail in the engineering process.

“Another award winner on the day was the newly-formed Year 8 team of Cyber Storm, for the innovative way they programmed their robot.

“Great applause rang out to encourage them, with the audience knowing that winning this award at such a young age when the competition was so tough was no mean feat,” Mr Noonan concluded.

The tournament awards went to the following teams (with their schools listed in brackets):

• Amaze Award (VIQC), GCA Gearers (Greig City Academy)
• Build Award (VIQC), MTS Terrorbytes (Merchant Taylors’)
• Design Award (VIQC), Gear Squad (Queen Elizabeth’s)
• Teamwork Champion Award (VIQC), HBS Rampage (Henrietta Barnett)
• Teamwork Champion Award (VIQC), Hyperdrive (Queen Elizabeth’s)
• Teamwork 2nd Place Award (VIQC), GyroFusion (Queen Elizabeth’s)
• Teamwork 2nd Place Award (VIQC), Gear Squad (Queen Elizabeth’s)
• Robot Skills Champion Award (VIQC), HBS Rampage (Henrietta Barnett)
• Judges Award (VIQC), HBS Rampage (Henrietta Barnett)
• Think Award (VIQC), Cyber Storm, (Queen Elizabeth’s).

The QE teams were:

Gearsquad, Year 9: Niyam Shah; Jai Akilesh Kaza Venkata; Nathan Woodcock; Darren Lee
Dipesh Dhavala
Hyperdrive, Year 9: Soumil Sahjpall; Aarush Verma; Maxwell Johnson; Adarsh Aggarwal;
Vedant Shah
Silicon Vortex, Year 8: Saim Khan; Aadish Praveen; David Wang; Ayaad Salahuddin; Samarth Deshpande
Cyber Storm, Year 8: Joel Swedensky; Sayan Patel; Hadi Al-Esia; Rayan Nadeem; Shreyas Mone
Hypercharg, Year 8: Pavan Kovuri; Shreyaas Sandeep; Chanul Athukoralage; Muhammad Shah; Chanakya Seetharam
Gyrofusion, Year 9; Yash Narain; Ashish Yeruva; Shivam Singh; Varun Srirambhatla; Vignesh Rajiv.

A QE record of five Year 12 Technology students have been awarded prestigious Arkwright Engineering Scholarships this year.

The five all successfully negotiated a gruelling selection process almost a year long to win the scholarships, which will provide them with financial and mentoring support throughout their A-level studies.

On a visit to QE’s Technology department, Arkwright local liaison officer John Coleman said: “The school has always shown an excellent standard of engineering students, with this year demonstrating a particularly talented cohort.”

The programme is run by the national STEM education charity, The Smallpeice Trust, and aims to inspire future leaders in engineering.

Nationally only a third of the 1,370 students who applied for a coveted Arkwright Engineering Scholarship were successful this year.

Scholars were selected for their potential as future engineering leaders by an assessment of their academic, practical and leadership skills in engineering disciplines.

These were gauged through a selection process comprising an assessed application form including: a teacher’s reference; a two-hour, problem-solving aptitude examination, and a university-based interview.

QE’s Deshraam Ganeshamoorthy, Devin Karia, Tanishq Mehta, Yai Sagolsem and Ukendar Vadivel each receive £600, which they can use to buy components and materials to complete their personal technical projects, or to purchase textbooks, or to fund their attendance on technical courses. They are pictured here receiving their certificates at a ceremony held at ceremonies held at the Institute of Engineering and Technology in London.

The School receives £400, which it must spend on equipment, materials or teacher training to enhance the delivery of STEM subjects.

The boys will also be allocated a mentor – typically a professional engineer – who can provide advice and guidance about future study and career development, and even technical advice to help with projects.

There will also be a variety of exclusive events run by partner companies, universities and trade associations that are designed to give participants an insight into aspects of different sectors of industry and academia.

Congratulating the boys on their success, Head of Technology Michael Noonan said: “All of the current scholars at QE either are, or have been, involved in technology clubs and competitions at the School.

“These have undoubtedly helped them to build a profile of engineering experience requisite for winning an Arkwright Scholarship.”

And Mr Noonan had some advice for younger boys inspired by the five’s success: “Whilst the application window has now closed for Year 11 students, boys in Years 9 and 10 may want to begin thinking about building up a profile of engineering experience, which could put them in line to receive a scholarship in the future.”

Each scholarship student is linked to an associated company or individual, as listed below:

• Deshraam Ganeshamoorthy: Arkwright Benefactor
• Devin Karia: ERA Foundation (a non-profit organisation supporting engineering skills development)
• Tanishq Mehta: RAF Charitable Trust
• Yai Sagolsem: Arkwright Benefactor
• Ukendar Vadivel: The Worshipful Company of Scientific Instrument Makers

The School also currently has one Arkwright Scholar in Year 13, Dylan Vekaria.

QE’s new robotics suite is already proving a major hit with the boys, after being opened at the start of term.

The dedicated facility in the Technology corridor has been created in a large former changing room and fully equipped to help young roboteers develop their skills.

It is expected that QE will field a record number of robotics teams – possibly as many as ten – in the 2019-2020 season, so the room is constantly busy before and after school, as well as at breaktimes and lunch.

This will be only the fourth year in which QE has been involved in the VEX robotics competitions, yet the School has very quickly made its mark on the world stage. In 2017, two teams won places at the international finals in Kentucky at the first attempt; in 2018, QE became the first-ever UK school to win a world title, and last academic year a record four junior VEX IQ) and one senior (VEX EDR) teams picked up a string of awards in the US, with one becoming the first UK team ever to reach the competition’s Teamwork Challenge finals.

QE’s Head of Technology teacher Michael Noonan said: “Enthusiasm for robotics here is extremely strong, so we are delighted to be able to offer the boys a dedicated facility, which includes the School’s first permanent EDR field as well as two raised permanent IQ fields.

“We’re all looking forward to another great year of competition nationally and, hopefully, internationally,” added Mr Noonan, who won the Teacher of the Year Award at last year’s UK VEX robotics finals in Telford.

In addition to the new IQ and EDR fields, the suite features:

• A new smartboard for displaying real-time game information;
• Six desktop computers for CAD and Design applications
• A breakout space with two whiteboards, to spur creative discussions
• A library of books, resources and past designs
• Ample storage space
• Wireless internet
• And a display area for QE’s rapidly growing collection of trophies!

Year 8 boys combined Mathematics and Science with some exciting new materials to come up with creative solutions to everyday problems.

The STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering & Mathematics) enrichment day involved pupils working in teams, with each allocated a different business role.

After first designing and building a prototype, they then pitched it to a team of ‘dragons’ – expert assessors modelled on those seen on TV’s Dragons’ Den.

The day was run by Simon Kettle, Executive Director of STEMworks, a not-for-profit company dedicated to promoting STEM.

He gave the boys a design brief, encouraging them to think about possible applications for materials such as D3o – a substance discovered at the University of Hertfordshire in 1999 that is soft and flexible when worn, but impact-resistant in a collision. The pupils also considered how the design of mobile apps might be used to help disabled people.

The boys worked in their teams in roles covering graphic design, marketing and product manufacture, and as the managing director.

The winners chosen by the dragons included a prototype for luggage that could be used to charge a phone whilst a passenger waited in an airport and a wristwatch to help those suffering with dementia remember to take their medication.

The day was supported by STEM ambassadors from German multinational Siemens and the London-based engineering consultancy, Waterman Group, who spoke to the boys about careers in engineering.

Five veterans of QE’s past national and international successes in space design competitions returned to Barnet to help stage an inter-school Galactic Challenge.

Aadil Kara (OE 2010–2017), who has just completed the second year of a Physics degree at Imperial College, is currently Chair of the Galactic Challenge (GC) – a regional competition for younger pupils and a sister competition to the UK Space Design Competition (UKSDC). In his final year at QE, Aadil progressed from the UKSDC to the International Space Settlement Design Competition, hosted by NASA’s Kennedy Space Center.

Aadil, worked with QE’s Head of Physics, Jonathan Brooke, to help the School host a Galactic Challenge for secondary schools in London.

“Old Elizabethans are currently playing a key role in the organisation of both the UKSDC and the GC,” said Mr Brooke. “I’m hugely impressed by their willingness to give up their time to support these competitions which give children from schools across the country experience of working in large teams under a tight deadline – a taste of the challenges associated with professional life that are difficult to replicate in the classroom.”

Helping Aadil and Mr Brooke were Aadil’s QE contemporaries and former UKSDC co-competitors, Neelesh Ravichandran, Harikesan Baskaran and Sam Bayney, as well as David Dubinksy, who attended QE from 2012–2016. Neelesh, Harikesan and Sam all served as Coordinators on the day, while David, who, like Aadil, reached the international stages of UKSDC in his year, was the volunteer CEO for one of the competing teams, or ‘companies’.

The Galactic Challenge is a space industry simulation challenge for students aged 10-14. Children design a settlement in space within just a few hours, competing against other teams, as well as the clock.

At QE, in addition to the School’s own Year 7 company, named Columbus Aviation, there were entries from: Dame Alice Owen’s School; The Charter School, North Dulwich; The Henrietta Barnett School and The Latymer School.

Aadil said: “We run GC competitions throughout the country firstly to stimulate students’ interests in STEM from the early ages of secondary education, and secondly to help them develop ‘soft skills’, including team-working and interpersonal skills. Having first participated in the process in the Sixth Form, it was a pleasure to be able to bring the competition back to the School.”

The ‘companies’ worked to complete a task set by the fictional Foundation Society. In the morning, they were given a Request for Proposal (RFP) co-written by Aadil that reflects a typical design brief in the space engineering industry; they then spent the day producing designs in response, assisted by a volunteer ‘CEO’ for each company.

The scenario involved them jumping forward to 2069, coinciding with the celebration of the centenary of the Apollo 11 moon landing. Students produced designs for Armstrong, the first holiday resort on the moon, named in honour of Neil Armstrong, famously the first person to step on to its surface in 1969.

The Armstrong resort had to include a commemorative area around the Apollo 11 landing site and to host trips from tourists visiting from other settlements around Earth’s orbit. Competitors also had to find a way to make the lower half of the Apollo 11 Lunar Model (which remains on the moon’s surface) the centrepiece of a tourist attraction, whilst considering how to conserve the site.

The companies’ design proposals considered almost all aspects of the design of a futuristic space settlement, from the activities offered to tourists to the methods of power generation.

At the end of the day, the companies presented their work in ten minutes to an audience of parents, their peers, and a judging panel. In the presentations, students suggested ideas including: settlements made out of recycled materials; rearing rabbits on the moon, and Earthrise viewing platforms, with the home QE team suggesting lunar bungee-jumping. The winning team was a combined company – Astrodyne Delta – drawn from Dame Alice Owen’s School and The Charter School, North Dulwich.

Afterwards, Neelesh, who has come to the end of his second year at Imperial, where he is reading Electrical and Electronic Engineering, said: “Volunteering at UKSDC is a truly rewarding experience. The enthusiasm, curiosity and ingenuity of the participants is awe-inspiring and has served to remind me of why I study engineering. Both these competitions are a test of character and imagination, for volunteers and participants alike.”

Harikesan has finished the second year of a Mechanical Engineering/Computational Engineering and Design at Southampton. He starts a placement with Rolls-Royce Motor Cars this month. “Volunteering at the UKSDC and GC competitions provides an invaluable opportunity to encourage students to see STEM [Science, Technology, Engineering & Mathematics] in its true colours.”

David, who has just finished the third year of an Aeronautical Engineering degree at Durham University, still recalls the inspiration he drew from the UKSDC himself: “Taking part in the competition sparked a strong obsession with space; I was drawn by the utopian, fantastical designs of future space settlements and enjoyed imagining life in such a future. I opened a space society at QE, which some OEs may remember, and attended the annual Student Space Conference in Year 12, a fantastic event organised by the same parent organisation as the Galactic Challenge, the UK Students for the Exploration and Development of Space (UK SEDS). At Durham, I’ve also joined the university’s SEDS branch where we had some great networking with brave local startups and have helped organise trips to the Student Space Conference. My first internship was in a small electronics company, as it was technically in the space sector.”

Although the internship proved to be a disappointing experience, during his time there he was able to re-focus on what he really wanted – “to pursue unprecedented and utopian technology design” – which led him into the field he is currently targeting, namely “minimal-fuel, lighter-than-air travel, in other words engineering modern blimps and airships!” It is, reflects David, “all a long chain of events from saying ‘yes’ to my friend asking me if I wanted to fill an empty space in the first QE UKSDC team, which I turned down at first because I was nervous!”

Sam has finished the second year of a Medicine degree at Southampton. He said: “It’s good to see kids taking an interest in these types of projects at this age – it develops skills they will need to solve the global problems facing us in the near future.”

A QE team impressed the judges with their presentation skills as they explained how their glider drone design could help save black rhinoceroses from extinction.

Judges at the live finals of the International STEM Youth Innovation Competition at the Royal Air Force Museum in Colindale, London, unanimously agreed that QE’s Year 12 Rhinodrive team should win the Oral Presentation Award.

The competition involved several elements, from the judging of presentations conducted by industry and conservation experts, to the actual flying of a drone, where the challenge facing the teams was to survey 15 species in their simulated natural habitat.

Head of Technology Michael Noonan said: “It had been a long journey requiring great dedication for our boys to even reach the international finals, so they were exhilarated to be there, even though the standard of competition was very tough indeed.”

“The boys performed admirably, using the drone technology to spot all but one animal on their survey – a pesky snake camouflaged into a tree branch!”

The STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering & Mathematics) competition, run by the British International Education Association (BIEA), drew entries from schools in countries including China, the United States, Macau, Poland and Bosnia & Herzegovina. Its theme was Fighting Extinction Using Drone Technology.

The team comprised Deeps Gandhi, Aryan Jain, Simon Sherriff, Ben Domb and Tarun Bhaskaran. They secured their place in the international finals partly because they opted to design and build their own drone using parts which they 3D-printed themselves, rather than buying an off-the-shelf, proprietary machine, as many other teams did. “This set them in an élite group, along with a gifted and talented academy team from Palo Alto, California,” said Mr Noonan.

Even more impressively, they designed and built the drone while adhering very strictly to their £100 allocated budget, again, unlike many of the other teams.

However, what had been an advantage earlier in the competition would prove to be a challenge in the finals, as the demonstration flight at the start of the day’s competition used the very same drone that many of the teams were using, thus giving QE’s competitors the opportunity to pick up tips by observing the trial flight. The QE team nevertheless performed well, Mr Noonan stated.

“After the judges visited, the boys were in a confident mood that the presentation of their ideas and professional layout of their resources had set them in good stead.” That confidence proved justified when the team’s name was one of the first to be read out as the presentations began.

And although naturally disappointed to miss out on the top prize of £5,000, there were no real hard feelings, as Mr Noonan explained: “A Bosnian team won this accolade for an incredible performance, despite challenges of funding and lack of facilities. The boys felt this was well deserved, and simply revelled in what had been a great experience.”

Team member Deeps said: “Participating in this competition has not only allowed us to think about our ability to impact global issues such as conservation through STEM, but has also taught us key skills such as time management, teamwork and communication.”

After the awards ceremony, the boys headed to Waterloo Pier to board the London Belle barge and then spent an enjoyable evening on the Thames in the company of the judges and other participants.