A group of students from Falmouth School were commended on their teamwork after attending the regional heat of the Tomorrow's Engineers EEP Robotics Challenge.

RAF St Mawgan hosted the event as part of the national STEM challenge to inspire young people to get involved with science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.

Lego Mindstorm kits were provided to the schools from across the county, but each team designed and built their own robots and no two were the same.

The challenge included a speed race, a number of technical tasks as part of a fictional humanitarian aid mission with the RAF, a presentation to a panel of judges, and a teamwork task that was deliberately not revealed until the day to test quick thinking.

Air Commodore Mark Hunt, director ground training for the RAF, visited the schools’ teams and was enthused by their great ideas and competitive spirit.

Erika Smallridge, from Engineering UK, who ran the event said: “The teams have been extremely positive, inspiring for me actually. They’ve been talking to the Air Commodore about their ideas for engineering and it’s brilliant what they’ve been challenging themselves to do.”

The challenge run annually by the the RAF in partnership with Engineering UK, Helsington Foundation, and Rolls Royce. The competition is curriculum-linked and sees students aged between 11 and 14 working in teams to solve real-world engineering, technology and computing challenges.

While Falmouth School were not the winners on the day, that accolade when to Launceston College, the team was praised for the way they had worked as a team.