Students take part in VEX National Competition

Sir John Talbot’s VEX team recently took part in the National Competition at The International Centre, Telford. This event saw 58 teams from all across the UK competing for a coveted place at the World Championships to be held in Kentucky, USA.

The competition was split into two divisions, Brunel and Lovelace and each had three competition areas. Over the two days, each team competed in 10 team challenges, in order to score points which would be accumulated over the round. To qualify for the knockout tournament we needed to place in the top 30.

With two teams entered, we were hopeful of making this next stage. Unfortunately, the competition was fierce, resulting in just one of our teams qualifying for the knockout round. During this section the SJT team faced challenges which really tested and developed their teamwork skills. Whilst we had the pleasure of sitting in the hot seat for a couple of rounds, our score of 110 points just was not quite enough on this occasion to make the top three and head to America.

Even though we returned without a trophy, the teamwork shown by our students was fantastic! We are extremely proud of the way they conducted themselves with pride and determination all weekend. At one point, a robot was smashed but even at this low moment, the students pulled together and continued on. The group have really developed their STEM skills over the competition and are already talking about next year’s event, eager to get started and drive forwards.