SATRO COMPANY CHALLENGE - SIEMENS "NEXT BIG THING"

Today was the final judging for the KS4 Siemens Company Challenge. Taking place at Siemens headquarters in Frimley, the judging comes after 4 months of very hard work! Teams from ACS Cobham School, Charterhouse School, The Connaught School, Gordon's School, LVS Ascot, Reading Girls School and Tomlinscote School attended the Kick-off event back in January, when they were given briefs for their projects. The teams were given the opportunity to choose from a list of 5 categories, on which they would base their project and 'invent' a product. The categories were:

• Improving a patients experience when being scanned to identify potential health problems.
• A way of improving healthcare for elderly patients.
• The use of technology, internet and mobile devices to ensure that people living in a remote part of the world have access to the same level of healthcare as those who live in cities and major towns.
• Using products and technology that is available for us, improving the immediate follow up and response to save more lives after a possible natural disaster (tsunamis, floods).
• Thinking of patients, doctors and engineers, a way to control an infectious disease (e.g. Ebola) and reducing it's impact. 

Over the past 4 months, each group of students has been working with a staff member from Siemens who has been acting as a mentor to help guide the students in their project. The students will have learnt about marketing and product development, and what it is like to work in the technology/engineering industry - directly from those who do. This experience will have provided the students with a great item to include in university applications or interviews. 

Today the students have been presenting their projects to a team of judges. The teams were working towards 3 winning categories, "Best Presentation", "Innovative Research & Development", and "Overall Winner". Each team lead a very strong presentation and had worked very hard in the months running up to today's judging. The winners of each category were as follows; Overall Winners - Reading Girls School, Best Presentation - Tomlinscote School and Innovative Research & Development -  Gordon's School.