This year saw excellent levels of achievement in both competitions, with all participants in the Physics Challenge getting a medal, and nine of the ten entrants into the Chemistry Olympiad also bringing home a prize.

The Senior Physics Challenge is organised by the University of Oxford, with nearly 4,200 students participating worldwide.  SCG students achieved four silver medals, one bronze upper-level medal and five bronze lower-level medals. A silver medal constitutes finishing in the top 19%, with Bronze 1 being representative of the top 32% and Bronze 2 57%. Curriculum Director Jamie Hopkins described this year’s examination as a ‘very challenging paper’, reflecting the exceptional levels of attainment from all students involved.

Special thanks go to staff members Jamie Hopkins and David Hearle for supporting the students and marking the papers. Colin Lobley for assisting Jamie in organising the event, and for Amanda Hartley-Newton and Caprice Bennett for helping supervise the exams in the Learning Resource Centre.

At this year’s UK Chemistry Olympiad, we had ten Year 2 students enter, achieving four gold and five silver medals. Two of the silver medals were one mark off a gold and the final student was one mark off a bronze medal. Yet again, this represents a remarkable level of achievement from students at the college.

The first round was a written test designed to test chemical knowledge with real-world chemistry problems, as the final this year is held in Switzerland, it focused on the chemistry of cheese. This was then marked by teachers at the school, with all high scorers having their papers physically submitted to the Olympiad to be spot-checked.

Round 2 will be a long weekend in Nottingham of training and assessments, with the 30 highest scoring students from around the country in round one participating. The four best performers at this stage will have the exciting opportunity to represent the country at the International Olympiad.

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