STEM LEADERSHIP CHALLENGE 2018

The weekend of 21/22 Apr saw a team of 10 1st Battalion Army Cadets and three supporting CFAV travel to Welbeck College, the Defence Sixth Form College near Loughborough to take part in the STEM Leadership Challenge.  This competition attracted teams from all cadets forces throughout the UK and the Bn Team comprised cadets from all 4 companys led by the STEM Ambassador, Lt Shirley Montgomery.

This was certainly no restful weekend which also required cadets and CFAV to be billeted in tents that had a habit of collapsing midway through the night in rain storms.  The first day required the Team to complete 12 half-hour activity stands which provided constant mental and physical challenges.  Highlight for the cadets was the RLC bomb disposal robot where each cadet got the opportunity to defuse a “bomb” using the £300,000 equipment.

On Sunday, the team went through the Bloodhound challenge, which was to design and build a car from KNEX components which would be powered by a small tube pressurised to 3Bar. The challenge was to get the vehicle to cover the most distance. Our team placed 6th out of the 23 teams.  The Bloodhound vehicle is a high technology project to build a car to break the 1000mph barrier.

The Team had an energetic but amazing weekend which saw them complete a series of innovative and demanding tasks, meeting new friends from around the country and gaining an insight into what the Defence College has to offer.  The next STEM weekend is planned for October in Salisbury Plain and the cadets are looking forward to that challenge which will see the regular Army bring along some of their most up to date vehicles and equipment all for the cadets to operate and complete engineering based task upon.