Design & Technology

This academic year has seen more incredible work emerge from all year groups and even a second national lock down didn’t stop them! From speakers to boats, lamps to pastries and a kevlar surveillance drone to name just a few, our pupils have relentlessly created, baked, designed and engineered amazing products both in the classroom and when working from home.

Sadly the second lockdown meant that our amazing GCSE and A Level pupils were unable to complete the practical elements of their course, but they still managed to complete all other aspects of their NEA to an exceptionally high standard. The quality of their design work was incredible and we had a huge range of innovative designs. We are delighted to have so many of our Year 11 pupils staying on to study A Level Product Design with us next year, and we are excited to see how they continue to develop their skills. We would also like to wish our innovative Year 13 pupils the very best of luck for their onward studies. This year sees an exceptionally talented cohort leave us for university, many of whom are going on to study product design or engineering. They NEA work was exceptional and we are incredibly proud of their achievements, in what has been such a challenging year.

Alongside our creative Year 12 A Level pupils, who have begun the initial investigations for their NEA this year, we had an amazing team of Year 12 pupils enter the Industrial Cadet Awards. This is a prestigious award run by the Engineering Development Trust. As a team, they developed, designed, and created a drone for military surveillance. By utilising Kevlar to ensure it was light weight the drone was designed to glide over a specified area with no engines running, using a camera with tracking technology to covertly photograph behind enemy lines. It was a complex design and manufacture project which they completed successfully, gaining high praise and a gold award from the trust. Well done to Ralph Wilson, Ralph Berry, Ben Bradley and Ben Millard. We also had several applicants for the prestigious Arkwright Scholarships too, and with them luck for the announcements later on this year.

Sienna Caven

Imogen Stewart

Our Year 10 pupils completed their mock NEA projects, developing and creating lighting products. We were delighted with the amazing variety of processes, materials and designs that were created and can’t wait to see what this group of talented pupils will make for their real GCSE NEA.

Year 9 have had a fun year creating anglepoise lamps, bug and animal houses and even designed and made vehicles which convert potential energy to kinetic energy for power. This last project was completed over the period of remote learning and we all enjoyed watching the videos of their test runs, with some very amusing results!

Our pupils in Year 7 and 8 have also been busy creating exciting products, crafting these though both CAD/CAM and traditional methods. We have been blown away by the amazing creativity and confidence of these pupils and look forward to seeing what wonderful creations they design next year. Our Year 7 and 8 Tech Club pupils have been busy making a wide variety of products including sustainable jewellery, boats, automata to name a few. Recently they also helped with the Our Place exhibition, making tiny architectural models of buildings in our area for the 2021 Ports Fest.

This academic year has, for all of us, been one of the most logistically challenging years our pupils have had, dealing with COVID-19 restrictions, school closures and cancelled exams. However, we are so proud of all they have achieved despite this, and we can’t wait to see what they do next!

Lianne Kan

Melissa Flack