During spring and summer 2024, a group of Year 7 to Year 9 students started their Bronze crest awards programme. They worked in groups deciding and designing their projects relating to science, technology, engineering and/or maths. Throughout the programme, the students worked hard, engaged well and challenged themselves by developing different skills such as problem solving, decision making, practical skills and safety, report writing, time management and organisation skills. All of the projects were completed toward the end of the last school year and after successful submission and approval of the Bronze Crest Awards paperwork, the students received their certificate. I’m very proud of these students and their amazing achievements. Here are some of the students with their certificate.

The new round of Bronze Crest Award will be starting after October half term so if you know any student who will be interested, look out for the parent/guardian email coming soon. In the meantime, here are some comments and advice from some of the students who completed their Bronze Crest Awards programme. 

My name is Thujani and I worked hard to create an amazing  project for the Bronze Crest award, and  what I picked was “what is the best flood  defence”.Isabelle and I brought equipment, balloons, boxes, and water, and used Canva for the project as well . Despite feeling nervous, I successfully completed the project after 20 weeks, even with Isabelle’s broken fingers . The project took time to write and start, but eventually became the best we could ever do. I have a saying  “believe it to achieve” and the importance of learning from mistakes. I learned from this and continued working hard, even despite Isabelle’s broken fingers. I worked harder and completed it even though it was only 20 weeks. My advice would be to always work hard and if you believe you can achieve. I really enjoyed it and  I got to work with my friends and it made me so happy.

 My name Isabelle , I worked tirelessly to help the rest of the team as much as possible  by creating a slide and leaflet. I  provided the majority of the necessary supplies and assisted Thujani in building the last result. Despite my  broken finger, I have worked together to build a flood defence out of wood and cardboard. Me and  the rest of our team  only spent 30 minutes per week on the project, which lasted 20 weeks. Despite the challenges, the team completed the project successfully, demonstrating the importance of teamwork and dedication to project success, so the promotion is helpful if you have more people to help with a big project like this.

My advice is how we could be in a team . It is easier to complete the work  and you can make more friends.I really enjoyed it. I got to work with my friends and it made me so happy.

For our investigation, we wanted to test what type of ball can bounce the highest. We also wanted to test whether the surface would affect how high a ball would bounce. We used tennis balls, bouncy balls in many different shapes and sizes and a metal ball. For our change of surface, we used a cloth and the tables in the classroom. We recorded our results in a barchart so we could tell how much the ball weighed and how far it bounced. Our results varied due to the change of surface. I really enjoyed the Bronze Crest as it was very fun and we could do a lot of experiments to test out different things. It was also fun to see what the other groups had come up with and we could learn a lot from each other. My advice for the next group is to decide beforehand  what your investigation is about, always look back at your booklets to see if you have missed something or have forgotten to write in it and most importantly HAVE FUN! 🙂

BY Dorothy 

I enjoyed Bronze Crest, even though it was difficult to switch groups half-way through, but it made me improve designing and teamwork skills and I made good friends with the people in my group. My design was successful and I am very proud of the effort I put in with myself individually and my group and the shin pads I brought in were completed well. As for advice to give to the new group of students, I would recommend being organized, asking your group or the teacher for help when needed, make sure everyone in your group brings something in or has a job, and the project is a good quality that everyone is happy with.

Bronze Crest has been a pleasure, Thank You, Nikolaj 

For my project, I worked in a group of 3 to find out which of 3 different liquid dish soaps work the best. We boiled agar powder with water, poured it into petri dishes which then cultured microorganisms inside the sealed environment to grow mould from them. We used samples from plates cleaned (separately for the same amount of time, same quantity of soap, same type of dish) with each type and then swabbed a sample of the cleaned plates into each petri dish and waited for results. I really enjoyed this project because it was something that wasn’t too easy, yet at the same time challenging. I also enjoyed the fact that in this specific experiment, the results didn’t come out exactly how we had predicted (our theory).  If anyone else was to attempt something like this, I would advise them to get the practical done well before the 16 week mark so you can finish all of the paperwork in time (There is A LOT of it). Beatrice

Last school year, I got to take part in the Bronze Crest at school, and it was really fun. My group decided to do our project on how a realistic flying car would work, which was super exciting but also way harder than we thought. It definitely challenged us, but we learned so much along the way. At the start, we figured out it’s better to begin with smaller, easier tasks before trying to tackle something as big as a flying car. We didn’t realise how complicated it would be, but instead of giving up, we found ways around the things we couldn’t do. We had to change some parts of our project to make it more manageable, and that helped us keep going and finish it. What I liked most was how my team never gave up, even when things got tough. We all worked together, helping each other solve problems, and that made the whole thing a lot more fun. It wasn’t easy, but we stuck with it and did our best. Doing the Bronze Crest Award, especially with such a cool project like the flying car, was an amazing experience. I would definitely do it again. It taught me that even when something seems impossible, you can make it work if you keep trying and don’t give up. For anyone thinking of doing the Bronze Crest Award in the future, I would advise picking a project that’s simple and has a reachable goal. It’s a lot better to do something that you know you can complete rather than something too difficult. Starting small and working your way up is the best thing to do. Chloe

Thank you for reading our Bronze Crest Award article and well done again to all of the students who achieved their certificate!