By Eleanor P, Year 10 Journalist Lead

A band of four students sat in the atrium on a Wednesday morning in March, waiting for a cab. Passersby might have wondered what on earth they were going to do: four seems too small for a sports team, and besides, we weren’t wearing PE kit. Perhaps debating? Hearing the semi-awkward silence would have marked some of us out as ‘not talkative’ (though, obviously, you can be quiet normally and a brilliant public speaker). 

Instead, a much superior tournament lay ahead of us – an observant viewer may have noticed some Physics textbooks poking out of our bags, or heard gentle whispers of ‘V=IR, Q=It, v2=u2+2as…’.  – for we were about to journey in our noble carriage (a taxi) to St Helen’s School, Northwood, to do battle using the laws of the universe. 

Upon arriving in the pleasant land of Northwood, we began our day by breaking some of the ice between us and the other teams, before we received a quick briefing on what lay ahead for us – an exhilarating experiment challenge, an enigmatic escape room, a captivating calculation race and a talk by a guest speaker who really liked bridges. (We also got lunch.)

The experiment challenge was up first, testing us to design an experiment to find the spring constant of a spring using the resources provided. Although we did not receive feedback on our write-up, we were all pleased that the teacher supervising our floor of the building acknowledged our ability to work independently, noting it on our experiment pack and telling us herself. I think something we could all agree on was that it was nice to have to figure something out for ourselves, instead of just performing a practical needed for the GCSE exams! I also really enjoyed the opportunity to work with 3 other people: it meant we could not only split things up and get things done more efficiently but also bounce ideas off each other, a nice change for a subject that can be quite independent.

During the experiment we got taken out for the escape room, where we had to complete a series of very cryptic puzzles with few instructions, only one calculator and all our physics knowledge. An unfortunate pattern of finding the correct answer nearly immediately, getting put off by the equipment set up, then eventually reaching the right answer again meant we didn’t make the fastest time that day, but we did have a lot of fun! 

The next round, the calculations race, was perhaps where the day came closest to an arcane medieval sporting event. People would sprint the width of the hall to collect a problem, dash back, furrow their brows and solve it as quickly as possible with their teams, and then send another member to collect the next, testing all of the teams’ quick – and accurate! – thinking. Although it was by turns stressful and very frustrating (those pesky powers of ten!), we were delighted to come out third of ten on our floor! 

Finally, we reached the last activity of the day (well, barring the celebratory feast/school dinner), a talk from an alumna of St Helen’s who is a bridge engineer. When she introduced herself, I must admit I was a bit unsure of how interesting I might find it as I’m not involved in any engineering at school and it has never properly occurred to me as a career. However, it is no overstatement when I say that Ciara entirely changed my perception of the field, particularly since she spoke with such passion about her work. What I found most interesting was hearing about how she loved her job because of the impact she saw it having on other people – for example, she had worked on bridges in remote areas to improve connectivity in the region – as well as her fascinating career path, which was often reliant on her ability to embrace new 3D printing technology, something she had started using during her time at St Helen’s. Her story showed the impact maths and physics can have on real lives, which truly inspired me.

Finally, we were all treated to a ‘banquet’ in the St Helen’s canteen, where the champions of the tournament were announced. Despite not winning anything, we all left thoroughly enriched with a new (or rekindled) passion for physics and its applications – and most importantly, I think we all learned a bit more about each other.